Unfinished Scrolls
by BetweenTheSeaAndStars
Summary: A variety of stories in One and Two shots, sometimes more that have been distracting me for the Naruto world. SI's, OC's, pairings and non..meanderings and absolute destruction of timelines. If any get long enough I'll toss them into their own separate stories.
1. Root 1

AN: To start of the idea spamming..I have plenty in mind with this one it's just making all of it make sense. I wanted to do a still very damaged but in a different way root member, and I figured truthfully if they were so secreted would they even know their own names and ages from before?

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Eimin meant eternal sleep.

It was a name given to her so that she could answer to something besides Ku. Nine. Suffering.

Danzo hadn't said anything else than to give it to her.

She of course, held no opinion on the matter of something like a name. Because she was part of Root.

Eimin had dark blue eyes and darker navy hair. She dressed in navy that was shy of black just like her hair because it was harder to spot than true black at night. Her days were a never ending void. It was her nights, when not on a mission, the adrenaline rush and thrill of completing what she was told the only joys she was permitted. It was when she curled up on her hard cot in the Root base that Eimin would retreat into her mind.

She was part Yamanaka. She knew that, because it was in her file. An experiment. That was in her file too. Though she had another few Yamanaka relatives in Root she did not know them well. They had been sent to learn from the others in their clan at certain times, brought in later so as to have their bloodline limits known. They actually looked like Yamanaka's. Her facial structure was far too delicate for that. Her hair too dark. Apparently the only sign of something her sire gave her.

Not Eimin, because no one was supposed to know she existed. Her mother was a Yamanaka, one of the first Danzo had ever trained in the method he wished for absolute obedience as one of his many 'assistants'. She'd had a ..interesting..mission. Danzo wanted to collect and perfect weapons, to create soldiers that were loyal to him and undefeated. He called these born and raised in and for Root his 'seeds'.

Eimin was considered a 'failure' in many ways as she could not use the Yamanaka skills, she apparently had not inherited the bloodlines from whomever her sire was either. Danzo was content with her loyalty and that from an early age number Nine had been unattatched and obedient as he had expected of her experiment.

She never let him know why because the first time the young girl had been brought to Root's underground base rather then one of the safe houses, before she was of age to even enter the academy she had been left with an older student already being trained.

Eimin may not have the traditional Yamanaka gifts but they were warped, evolved, in her. She was always lightly brushing another's mind and they never noticed. She was just an observer. It had made her too smart, too wise for her age. It was why she had been brought to root young before even going to meet her peers. To be kept further in secret. As if she'd never existed above ground. The first student she had ever met had just been about to graduate. She'd copied his mental patterns, the emotional conditioning and obedience and held them tight to the forefront of her mind.

The constant exposure as she stayed there to more students who were already heavily into the program allowed Eimin to draw a blanket over her own mind and hide in plain sight. By the time she was actually beginning the true conditioning as opposed to the learning of obedience and basic skills she had carefully fractured her mind in two. She could switch between them easily. There were draw backs of course, one part of Eimin would stay stunted in her growth, still a child in her emotions and behaviors. The other, however, despite being a 'failure' had bloomed into one of Danzo's favorites. Enough to be granted a name so she could start being shown at times, one of the rare few chosen who would some day enter Anbu and gather information on all the Hokage and his agents did to report to Danzo. Doubtlessly one day given the missions to try and 'catch' attention of those with bloodlines and bear more seeds for root to grow.

Eimin's life had been a series of void and over abundance, fracturing her person even further until she privately identified as caught between. Because she had done the initial separation herself perhaps it was not so hard to deal with.

Kneeling before Danzo, cloaked in a hood to help hide the long ponytail of dark hair, she waited. Danzo liked his power plays, and skimming his thoughts as she did she could minutely adjust herself in infinitely small ways to keep him happy.

She was one of the most lethal to spar with. If Eimin could touch you, you died or were unconscious at best. She'd developed a bastardized version of the mind body jutsu that instead yanked the opponents mind out into a loss of control over their bodies while letting her make a copy to examine key things later, let her rip information from them, and then they collapsed as if in a coma where she could slit a throat on the way down. Everyone else thought it was a sort of paralysis jutsu, even if she used it on them. She let them think that. The shock to the mind always sent it under to recover but it was so draining she hated using it. She would have to analyze all the data far later as well so as not to give a hint of what it really did. Instead she'd been forced to learn medical ninjutsu, not to heal but to harm. There was often need for a medic nin to follow an anbu team and that was what Danzo wanted of her. His perfect little servant, who if need be could paralyze or put under her team. To blame it on others.

Eimin knew she shouldn't feel covered in filth, like she couldn't wash the stench of death off her body. But all she could do was fake the detatchment she shouldn't feel and wrap herself in the surface thoughts of others. The pleasant thing was when exposed to many, it just became a buzz of white noise. So Eimin liked crowds, because sometimes it was the only way to get silence.

Being alone, surrounded.

Kneeling and silent she waited. His surface thoughts -and most peoples- were the lightest, mostly useless outside of battle. He was content, smug. Proud, certain he had found a way to integrate her in. There was a number of Anbu that would be compiled, taking a test. Hattake had recently escaped warning of the attempted takeover and assassination of some of her fellows on the Hokage (failed) and Root was 'officially' disbanded. An easy time to slide Eimin in.

Eimin was young, a prodigy thanks to her mind. All of Root was but she was younger. Enough that she wouldn't be so suspicious. Shouldn't be so well trained and loyal. Ironically a few years back Eimin's detachment training had been lessened, she could fake being reserved but somewhat normal. It made hiding easier when she did not need to do so fully.

"You will have no written reports, no such contact. If I wish to seek you out I shall. You are to not seek or contact any other from Root or give any indication you know of me besides occasional references to my person. You have completed the fight training but only just begun the emotionless and detachment. Of your loyalty you shall always claim Konoha. Konoha before all else. Repeat."

"I serve Konoha and only Konoha."

"Your rank."

"Undetermined. Trained for Anbu."

"Your name."

"Eimin."

"Family name?"

"I am an orphan. My family is Konoha."

Danzo hummed and walked around her. The form did not move, Eimin kept her eyes low, barely breathing so she could hold perfectly still. It was a predators stillness. At any moment Danzo could issue a command and she would obey. It was a pity Sarutobi had determined to absolve Root as far as he knew, because the greatness that this tool of his could have aspired to was immense. Still, to have a seemingly nobody with great skill, medic nin plenty capable for the field if not the hospital..in place to use as needed. To gather and await the harvest of information. Not to mention the chance of the occasional seduction of a teammate to take the edge off a mission when she was older.

He knew Hattake would end up in his own layers of Anbu again, likely leading. Much of Anbu would scatter into new cells, new groups. Eimin would slide in and blend, and with any luck and work she would become a lynch pin. She could pretend to keep her emotions well enough, but then it was something of a girl's touch he supposed. Danzo had always disdained how emotional the feminine variety of Root was, took longer to train obedience for all they were utterly ruthless when directed. In this, that touch of emotion would be useful.

"Your age"

"Assumed between eight and twelve, Danzo-sama."

"Assumed?"

"I am an orphan. I am unknown. Does it matter?" her words were soft, serious and monotone. It would do.

"When shall you contact me?"

"Never."

"When shall I contact you?"

"I do not understand."

Danzo chuckled as her answer was flawless. Of course she didn't understand, in her mind the idea was simply not possible as he had stated she would not know. Yes, his weapon was ready.

"You shall attempt to emulate the lesser shinobi outside of missions. Develop a facade of likes and dislikes. Become unnoticeable."

Eimin bowed her head.

"Report with the others to the Anbu trials. Dismissed."

There was no word of acknowledgment. She was gone.


	2. Screw with them All 1

SI with no memory of the Naruto world as Neiji..only female. why do I feel like I should know what's coming? Well, I may be a caged bird, but there's got to be a way to pick the lock! Seriously though who calls their daughter 'screw'?

I decided on a new one. It just hit me and wouldn't let go. Yeah. So far out of canon that you can consider this massively AU. I am not fond of the really weird stuff that happens so expect this to stay with very much first season impressions of ninja and the bijuu. I hope I surprise you!

)_)_)_)_)_

Death messes with you.

There's so many versions of reincarnation floating out there I think I remembered some Chinese ghost story that involved hammers that upon striking your soul and making you forget everything.

If that is true I must have been glanced by them because I remember some things. Sounds, feelings, impressions of faces. The scary part was as soon as these memories would come they'd slip away as my awareness started to come into being. Aside from random thoughts of wisdom that seemed 'harmless' it was as if I would remember only to have it permanently forgotten.

So I could recall there was such things as Chinese Ghost Stories, and having seen them as a movie in a form of animation, recall everything about that but not when or where I saw the film. Not with whom. I could not remember the whole film just the part where because the main characters almost didn't make it they decided not to risk it again.

I remembered people I felt love for just swift enough to have their voices, sounds, smells, names, memories..tugged away. It was gross but it reminded me of when I sliced my finger and it became lightly infected..the feeling of pulling the thick slightly hard pus out. The oddly pleasant empty feeling that it left behind without pain.

That memory slipped away too as soon as I thought it.

My world narrowed to soft warmth and sounds, to thrumming senses and noises all around me that were felt more then heard. It felt so new, so strikingly different though I lacked what to compare it to that I latched on, tightly.

Early days blended and blurred until I found my eyes open and staring around curiously. There was always a soft sense of peace when I would look into the dark haired beauty who would hold me. He was male but it was such an ethereal beautiful face on one. One of my thoughts that slipped away into baby nonsense was that was one lovely angel.

I later learned this was my Tou-san. The first time I called him such his eyes went comically wide. It was nearly impossible to see the iris around the white it blended so well but the feel around him was saturated with humor and adoration. I would later learn it was because I was so very informal.

He named me 'screw'. What did he expect in a child really? For some reason when he explained the name it was more in the rotation, and as I aged I grasped it had something to do with the fighting forms I often saw my elders spinning in. A sort of hopeful proclamation that I would be great. It was from one of the disgruntled youths I was left sitting with while working on my stretching exercises when I could barely stand, I could sit though and stretch. Anyways, during that time that I heard different 'slang' involving my name. Cruel jokes they clearly thought I was too foolish to understand. I had picked up on this right away, that apparently children as small as myself did not generaly follow the conversations around them as I did. I don't know why I knew this, but I had a complete grasp on the knowledge that I was unusual. I kept quiet about my ability to understand, I decided to gather information.

However the first time I heard the slang of 'screwing with someone' in the sense of pranking or messing with someone, and the severe formality of my clan, I decided to incorporate that myself. Somehow. Really, my clan was so serious that for some reason it grated on me even as I found comfort in the dignity. Dignity yes, but the sheer boredom and stuffiness could be put away. Well, they were in for it then.

My years flew by. I did get the feeling children shouldn't be able to do what I was at an early age but a lecture amongst my peers by an old wrinkled branch member solved that question. Apparently clan children develop earlier, faster. Something about our heritage making us more like double or triple our age in physical abilities. It was..curious.

I had the feeling it was connected to the graceful humming I felt all around me. I played with it sometimes, but because I did notice how the eyes of the clan were ever on us, I did it while I watched my older cousins practice. So my shifting tumbling chakra in my body would be unnoticed as I pushed it from place to place, feeling as it passed each point in my body that seemed to ebb or increase the flow. It was, interesting.

I managed this for an impressive three months before an elder watching the progress of two of my loudest (which in the Hyuuga clan is not saying much) cousins glanced over to ensure I was holding still. I heard from all the gossip that Toro-san apparently started to choke and stammer in a most undignified fashion. What I did remember was suddenly larger hands batting mine away as I curiously pressed on one of the points I could feel the build up of the liquid that wasn't my blood coursing through me.

I was brought before my father and they were all arguing, in soft controlled manner but I had the distinct feeling it was like shouting and yelling for others. Finally when someone exasperatedly mumbled 'It's likely just an accident, calm down. It isn't as though little Neiji-chan knew what she was doing."

Well. I just had an issue with being thought of as stupid. I'd never bothered to showcase my understanding before this point save in the shortest one word phrases I could but no one had insulted my intelligence before!

"Pressing where it got slow." I said. It was hard to understand as I was small, just five and I lacked the words I wanted. Still I could speak and do so clearly. We were clan children, at five we were already expected to be reciting important if highly simplistic poems and addressing our elders and superior's in dignified fashion.

The room was still. Not just quiet but still. Hushed, wary waiting and I had several pairs of pale orbs locked onto me. My father and uncle among them. Sighing once I simple looked at my father and spoke again, as if to someone being particularly foolish. Highly rude of me but considering what they implied in my lack of comprehension..I didn't care.

"The humming slowed down and I wanted it faster to match near my hands." I said, slowly, clearly, and as if speaking to an absolute idiot not my beloved 'tou-san'.

"Neiji-chan..you, are aware of your chakra?"

I paused, thinking over what I had heard of chakra and nodded. "It is warmth that courses in me, I like to move it around. It seems to warm further and respond better if I do."

"Show me."

I was used to seeing the clan's eye bloodline and so it didn't phase me in the slightest. While my speaking was advanced for my age it wasn't so far above what we were taught. I withheld a sigh, I already knew it was considered rude to do so and nodded. Not bothering to close my eyes I shifted the warmth now fully identified as my chakra, from my hands to shift down my arms, round my torso and then began the harder task of pushing it towards my feet. My feet tended to be cold and I liked pushing the warmth at them.

When it became sluggish at one of my thighs I pushed on the point it pooled and started to cool, tapping it with a little of the warmer chakra from my fingers and felt the sluggish trickle return to a pleasant flow as it went into my feet. Wriggling my toes I nodded, content as they warmed and then looked back up.

Huh. My clan looks _really_ stupid when stunned. I need to learn not to ever show that expression.

"How long?"

I knew the gig was up and over the next few hours, with snack and tea breaks as I was still a child, they got the full story out of me including how I had figured out that if I did that when my elder cousins were distracting people throwing their chakra around I could be left alone to explore. My disdain at the level of my instruction and lack of proper teaching in more then the basic katas made it clear that I was no average child.

Essentially it had become more of an inconvenience to stay silent on it.

The clan was thrilled to have the second son's heir be a genius. That I was a girl made it all the more exciting. After all, I would some day be given the caged bird seal and a genius as well as noble born female child was a boon to a clan that wished to only enhance it's status in the elemental nations. That I understood all this, even if I had to make my father clarify many points over the coming weeks, only bemused my father.

Then again, I got one of those fleeting inspirations I still was prone to, that would flow in and out of me with the plucking feeling but leave the impression behind. So maybe it was more then just genius?

"I will of course, do my duty for the clan. However, I will not curtail my ambition and abilities and belittle my heritage for the sake of producing children myself someday." I said, eyes serious. My father's own were warm, but it took truly knowing the man as I did to see it. My uncle was there as well and gave a rare amused thrumm to his own chakra.

"I think we can agree to that, easily, Neiji-chan. I would like you to enroll in the academy immediately."

"My cousins complain about the academy training they receive as being..sub-art?" I paused looking patiently at the two men who were such mirror images of the other. My father inclined his head

"Sub-par, to be beneath what is standard." I loved how my tou-san would not only correct but further expand my language.

"Indeed. " My uncle nodded, waiting. He was cunning and in many ways I think my uncle and clan head had me better figured out than my own father. There were times I had the sharp impression he was rather bitter I was his niece rather than his daughter. It was why he always called me Neiji-chan even as Hinata was addressed by him, my cousin a year younger was a gorgeous little thing with dark blue hair. My own was a rich brown like my father and uncle. However, my hair was on the cooler shade of brown, as if in the shadows and darker sections it tried to show the muddied iridescence of a raven's wing.

Like tarnished iron is what I called my hair. I rather liked it. My plumage as my father often said amused, I was a little bird as all branch members would call their beloved ones. The caged part was never mentioned.

"I will exceed, and excel befitting our clan." I agreed, but paused before I would prostrate myself as was expected upon conclusion of the informal yet so formal meeting. "I request proper training to make up for the time I will be spending that is on sub-par things rather than what I could learn from our exalted elders." It was rude, brash, daring.

Then again it had been my screaming in the midst of the night not even a week ago that had sent the clan swarming like insects at the strange sound. I hadn't known why, but the entire clan was used to my hyper sensitive nature at this point concerning chakra and I had been told to constantly flare and seek out chakra around me in the hopes of my not loosing it. Chakra sensors were rare and the Hyuuga when they produced them in the level's they considered a sensor, rather then the ninja world at large, became incredibly dangerous.

So I had been prodded awake often by a clansmember with the blessing of the family to poke me with a chakra flare anytime they walked by my room in the day or night. I would wake, try to pinpoint and flare back. It was spared on nights it was determined I needed full rest but rarely. I wasn't the only potential but I was currently the youngest. So when a week ago I felt a stranger's cold and eerie chakra, that felt like wet mud or sludge I didn't question what I was feeling. I loved listening to the elders speak of their lectures to the older cousins and one thing they always stressed was that often you did not have time to think something through.

I knew I did not know the chakras I felt and at that time of night they did not belong. Anbu were beyond my sensory level of course and so since I awoke to prod back and felt something strange..I started screaming. I didn't investigate or waste time running for my father I just started to shriek as loud as I could. In a clan so silent it was like a fire alarm and everyone woke up. In minutes they had the intruders who had managed to slip in going for Hinata. I had started to train alongside the other promising students since with our elders because since my sensory ability had made me shriek and flare my tiny child's chakra they had of course flared theirs at the sound and ran to where they sensed it.

Needless to say I was rather confused at the fussing attention that happened afterward. We had just gone through this not even six months ago when they learned I was a prodigy with my chakra to begin with, and my speech and reasoning..okay I was basically a far older person in my small body and for some reason when they'd say that in the clucking amused elder's way I'd just look at them like..well..yeah. Of course.

It just felt right.

The silence stretched on before finally my uncle chuckled. "Indeed. I will train you with your father myself."

Now I did bow, my forehead to the floor. It was a huge honor. I was going to be trained like a main branch heir..even my father had not been able to train me as he himself had been trained. I felt the flickering of my heart all the way to my nails it pounded so hard.

I would excel at the academy and prove that I deserved this.

It would be as if fate wrote it in stone.

I would prove that though my fate was in the branch house, I could bear fruit and flower far more than the sturdy trunk of the tree that bore up our family line. Perhaps, if I so far outshone my sweet little cousin, the heiress, I could finally show the elders that it was not the luck of birth that dictated greatness.

Due to my exceptional chakra sensitivity I was not yet to get the seal, but I knew at some point of my academy career I would do just that. It wasn't safe to impose it on my highly delicate system though at this point.

A small blessing.


	3. Forsaken Desert 1

AN: This is a prologue to the coming Forsaken Desert story. An OC/Gaara friendship _exceptionally_ slow (and oblivious) burner.

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Sute is a child of the desert at night, she dances with wild abandon when she can battle hidden from the blazing sun eschewing the light like a true ninja for secrets and silence. Pale blonde hair like bleached bone gleams in the shadows lit only by stars on a new moon's eve. Her skin is dark and tan, no more so than most in Suna but seems doubly striking against her palette of white gold hair and Suna tan eyes flecked in gold. She dresses in brown and white, for the heat and shifting weather. Covered because the wind storms that come up at times in the dessert can flay skin and muscle from bones while one still is alive. Blue would complement her. It would set off her colors and be beautiful, even Gaara can admit to that.

Yet it is deepest of crimson, the shade nearly a match for the carnage reflected in his tresses that she adorns herself with.

It is a blatant sign to all in Suna and it's outer laying territories.

Sute is claimed by Gaara.

There are times he's tempted to cover her in the rich color, to see her drenched in her own life but he always refrains. After all, her loyalty, her trust for all he has tried to prove he should never hold it..

It is his before anyone else.

Sute is the only thing Gaara can truly call his own, and so she lives. Some times he wonders why the other mortals they meet cannot view the world, and him, as she does.

She's called him a rabid beast before, flippantly as if stating the temperature but with that wry smile that is only his, calm in the absolute surety that if he wanted her dead she would be.

If so, she's his bone had been his response.

Her response was a laugh.

She lives another night because he allows it.

She lives another night because those who are foolish enough to try and strike at her, when she could not move swift enough to protect herself, bleed out from his sand coffin.

Should Sute die, it will be at his whim and no one elses.

That Sute takes comfort in that declaration confuses Gaara, but it pleases him as well.

Their friendship is not normal, not healthy.

But it keeps him sane.

Barely.


	4. Silk and Steel

An: Yeah I know but this will NOT leave me alone. Non massacre. Canon what Canon?

In a world of shadows and lies, the one who knows the truth is the king. And as Moriarty said, 'Honey you should see me in a crown.' {OcxItachi. I was going to use Shisui but Itachi just made it clear by page 11 that this was going to be his shining point. Ah well.)

Attempt to do this as one massive one shot failed and am now posting up parts, if I get closer to finishing it or it gets more love I'll pop it into it's own story.

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I was born to the Uchiha clan from a 'weakling' of a father and an outsider.

My father, Shin was the elder cousin many times removed of Fugaku. He was considered a failure for he only ever developed the Sharingan in his right eye. Because of this, he spent much of his time on missions outside of Konoha. On one of these he met my mother Minako. Minako was the third or fourth cousin of the Daimayo. She was a seamstress borne out of desire to do more than just be a noble woman on display; and her embroidery was so fine it was like the silkworms wove the patterns into their threads. She made all of her royal cousins formal wear and many of her clients spoke of her grace and beauty. She was well named. On one of her trips around the palace she was nearly killed, someone in a rush away from the Daimayo's guards decided since they failed in killing the fire lord, they could aim for his staff for a silent and clean getaway.

My father interrupted that and saved my mother. Despite being in his forties, twice her age, and considered quite old for an active shinobi, he was still handsome and wise. My mother fell in love at that moment. Though Uchiha are stoic and taught not to show their emotion, my father's eyes would soften whenever she'd bring that time up.

I think he fell at the same time.

Though it was exceedingly improper, my mother had made him a haori in thanks and when she made the Uchiha symbol for him, the reds flowed like the crystalline appearance of the sharingan and the white was subtly different. In various lights different words and phrases could be seen. She'd stitched words of his bravery and honor in pale bone against whiter marble hues. That haori still hung on our wall, pride of place when you walked into father's study.

It was a romantic gesture that if father had not been in love when he rescued the beautiful dark haired woman, he was then.

Uchiha's are fiercely romantic and passionate, they just hide it from everyone.

It took three years for father to court my mother. The clan had been hesitant until negotiations started and it turned out that though they were distant cousins, Minako was the fire lord's _favorite_ cousin. After that the Uchiha elder's couldn't approve fast enough. The gifts father brought and the respect he paid her family was the real thing, and the fire lord was sad to see her go but delighted she had found love. My mother of course, moved to live with my father.

I was born exactly nine months after they were wed. I came in the sweet summer rain in the twilight. I was named Doriimu. Dream.

Father was retired, and took his place among the elders though he was young for it. Mother had continued her work, and the Uchiha made her one of their only providers of formal garments. I had inherited her grandfather's eyes though was the best guess, my dark orbs were more a blood garnet than they should be, a dark black that glinted red in the correct lighting. My hair was black and rich like a crow's wing with black and blue and green or violet hues in the light like my mothers. My skin was pale as both of my parents, and I was told of my early years I was quiet and observant, but almost always smiling and laughing softly.

Mother knew I would have to become a shinobi from the start, father explained that all Uchiha are expected to learn how to fight because they make up the police force and protect everyone. Obtaining the Sharingan is considered a right of passage and would be necessary for me to be considered a true clan member, those who did not were not shunned but certainly had less authority. Often shinobi training would be a trigger in time to awaken the sharingan. However, how far to go after graduating the academy is up to the skills each child presents. Girl children have far more leeway as it is expected their end goal is to marry and begin a family of their own. I am entirely certain this is why when I seemed to enjoy playing with mother's inks and dyes and started making clumsy paintings, she encouraged me.

She had been raised in the court of the fire lord, she could ensure the same skills were passed on to me and thus since my father had never achieved full status from only one eye being sharingan, it was likely I would not be married by arrangement to keep the eyes in the clan. It was entirely possible I would not develop them at all. Calligraphy and sumi painting was my favorite lesson, I loved playing with ink and letting it sweep into shadows with so few brush strokes. My family mostly kept to our home and yard, and our immediate neighbors when I was little. Sometimes we had visitors, they would speak with my parents, and if I could be quiet, I was allowed to sit with them and fall asleep leaning on my parent's as they spoke with the other adults. I was a very quiet and patient child.

Most the time.

There were times I just couldn't resist letting the tingling feeling through my veins and muscles, sinew and bone, to let loose and I would suddenly be darting about the private Uchiha training grounds even in the earliest pre dawn hours or fading twilight. I would rush about, twisting and dashing, feeling the sting of air in my lungs and the punctures of small twigs and rocks under bare feet. I was a wild child then. I was silent when I did this but so utterly consumed with the rush of being alive I couldn't have held back no matter what. I did not throw shuriken or spar in these moments, I ran and twisted and ducked. I let the chakra direct me, move me, teach me. I felt my limbs stick and grasp hold to the trees and rocks, the water felt solid to me even as I ran along the light stream. It was entirely, completely, beyond senseless.

The clan let me.

There were whispers I was a potential prodigy.

When I was sat before the elders in my perfectly held dark kimono, sitting so still I had to remind myself to take half breaths softly. Couldn't be seen breathing, was to look like a doll not a little girl as mother taught me..

They'd ask me about my 'behavior.' So uncouth, completely not appropriate. When I explained, after prompting by an elder to actually speak up, that the tingles and rush of energy demanded it. That the twists and rash movements were what the very burn through my body -demanded- I do..

The entire attitude of the stuffy old elders in too many layers had changed.

It had become agreed that outside of the usual training, and the academy, I was free to persue my 'wildness'. I believe it was mostly because when the chakra that thrummed ever present through me was silent I was the utter perfection of a little uchiha girl doll. I was my mothers daughter.

The academy bored me to tears and I moved up in rank swiftly. What could they teach me of flowers and calligraphy that my mother had not already? She was nobility, grace of the highest order for all that she was removed sideways from it. I knew such things in the back of my mind for all that I let them slip by. Taijutsu made me scowl, I disliked the coarseness, the lack of elegance. When my atrocious scores came to notice of the elders they brought me back before them. Again the many layered small kimono, the ornate hair and sitting so still while they talked circles. When I bemoaned, carefully, overly word possessed, of the clumsy nature of my teachers and classmates. That I saw no reason to debase myself into such vulgar displays of clumsy and over strident nature..I suddenly was assigned to my uncle removed many times for private lessons.

Fugaku was the nightmare of many Uchiha children. He was ruthless, cold, vicious.

He was also elegant and refined and so entirely capable that I almost never spoke. I just _watched._

He was head for a reason. A prodigy in his own right Fugaku was a taskmaster of the level that harkened back to days of a single apprentice that techniques were passed down to. Nothing I did was good enough. His chosen prodigy was a year older than I was and his own son and heir.

Perhaps in someone else this would have caused bitterness.

It allowed me a lightness of heart. I did not need to be the one Fugaku rested so much upon, he had his heir in many ways. I was just the misguided niece so many times removed that was skilled and capable enough I had been placed in his hands. When he told me to work on something I felt I had already mastered while he tended to Itachi's learning a new jutsu I said nothing. I continued. I had been throwing shuriken with our clan's wire techniques for years but did as asked anyways. Over and over, my fingers bled and I said nothing. I did not eaves drop, I did not whine or wander. Fugaku was not the sort who would tolerate such.

Instead he came back over, grabbed my hands and turned them this way and that.

His eyes were red. Did my so far removed uncle never turn off his Sharingan?

"You use your wrist too much."

My eyes flashed, a deep garnet and I tilted my head as I looked at him. There was a strange sensation..a niggling.

"Only my right.."

I am right handed.

Fugaku frowned at me, furious at my tone and I clarified, the tingling was coursing through my veins and consolidating in my eyes as if I could feel it pushing "Just..my right? It feels like what you said was not entirely correct, Fugaku-sama.."

Perhaps it was the slightly more red of my eyes. I could feel it was acting up but I also knew it was a rich garnet hue to the bright blood tone it would be if I had the Sharingan. I had tried to summon it in the mirror often enough despite father's assurances I was far too young.

Perhaps having a prodigy for a child and being one himself allowed my many times removed uncle to pause and consider what I was struggling with for his silence became oppressive before his words slipped out, cut glass into my nerves even as I sensed Itachi's soft and warm aura shadowing to my weaker side. "You should use your shoulder more."

"Untruth."

There was a stillness. The mongoose about to strike the snake by my side as Itachi froze. His regard, for being one who eschews violence is a heavy thing. Fugaku's though is immense as a guillotine with the whistling of air as it plunges down towards your exposed neck. The sound hits you faster than the glint of the steel and the bite of pain. It is the sound, the split second warning that is so terrifying.

"Your father had as much potential at your age."

"Untruth."

I cannot help the words slipping passed my lips. Chapped as they are I lick them. It is not lady like, I would hear it from both of my parents if they observed such a reaction but it cannot be helped. My throat has suddenly become parched as the whirling tomoe's of my clan head regard me. A fat heifer suddenly perhaps, ready to slaughter or to market when he was expecting merely a calf withered with partial rations.

"Sasuke shows as much promise as Itachi."

"Untruth...but.."

"..." Itachi steps closer to my side. We are not good friends but in this last half year while I trained with his father and the clan's heir, we had come to an understanding of sorts. Itachi knows I am training only because I must. He knows it is pride, something that is so sacred to the Uchiha that has me determined to go as far as a shinobi as I am capable of. After all, he is planning to do the same. It is likely he shall graduate this year and unlike many of our clan children I do not begrudge him. How could I? We are so entirely different and I have voiced this enough when Fugaku has permitted us to socialize as we cool down (as we lay collapsed and trembling after our respective exercises) that Itachi is fully aware of my mentality. He also knows I have no interest in him as his fan girls do but that if it is decided I am to be pledged to him that I will do so.

We have a peculiar friendship. If it can be called that. An understanding perhaps.

"...neither true nor untrue. You do not know yet." I tried to hold the words back but this is my clan head. It is so a part of my upbringing to simply answer that the words spill beyond my jaw though I had it clenched tightly.

Fugaku's eyebrow raises and he begins to circle me slowly. Itachi does not move from my side. I do not let my eyes follow Fugaku's dark clad form. It is rare to see our clan head in his ninja garb, yet, every time we train he dons it. Perhaps he misses it? I know that retiring to only Military Police chief rankled him something fierce. He has gone around me several times now before his voice begins again, I can feel the black eyes of Itachi on my face watching me for his father. After all Fugaku is at an angle behind me and even his famed Sharingan eyes- possessing a level of them that only the clan heads develop that I am not privy to know the details of; indeed that I was even told of it was a great honor I keep secret as it is generally only clan head and heir that know of it but I was always training with them- cannot see my expression.

"Several hours ago a plot was uncovered against a prime clan of Konoha.."

"Truth."

"It was against the Yamanaka.."

"Untruth."

"Whom."

"I.." I lower my head, the sense fading momentarily. "I do not know."

"It will cause devastation to our enemies.."

"Doubly true."

"Can you say why?"

"N..No." I almost stutter but bite it back viciously. Ladies do not stutter.

"...It was avoidable."

"Untrue."

My chin is tilted up to meet with the black eyes of Fugaku. He has let his sharingan go and is simply looking at me. The man does not need the red of his eyes to inspire fear or loyalty, such is the strength of a clan head. My fingers creep towards Itachi of their own volition and I feel his own, cold and dry, within my hand. It is hesitant for all of two seconds. Itachi does hate being confused, but in this I cannot help him.

"Explain, if you can."

"Hai, Fugaku-sama..I.." I pause, collecting my thoughts and not moving. My chin is still pointing up, I hold the gaze between his brows as my mother taught before I proceed. "It has always been that I seem to know when one is telling the truth but I cannot yet pinpoint a lie to the precise inflection of single word.."

"Since when?"

"As long as I have drawn breath and been aware."

The answer seems to displease Fugagku even as I can see his eyes take on an unholy glee.

My chin is let go, and my hand grasped so tightly. If I didn't know Itachi as well as I do I would think he was trembling in fear. Instead I know what he has, hope. Excitement. The same whirling in Fugaku's dark eyes. The eyes of a man who had thought he faced only Hell every time he turned around and suddenly has a glimpse of a door that was never noticed. A way out.

"Doriimu-chan.." Fugaku does the unthinkable, he kneels in front of me. I know if Itachi was a little less perfect he'd be gasping in shock. I barely keep my jaw from falling open. This is my _clan head_ He does not belong kneeling to one such as me. He should never kneel. Fugaku is an incredible head, he seeks honor and power and pushes his son and family as hard as he does because so much of his power is crippled by the Hyuuga and the Hokage. By our own elders though it is never spoken of it just is one of those things that I know. So he inspires feverish loyalty in me. In Itachi, I know that Fugaku would lay his life down for the good of his clan and village though others may not see it. So the sight of this man I respect so deeply in my marrow kneeling before me, his sharingan put away to show me how earnest he is, awakens something in me.

I am not one who craves battle. I do not volunteer for the training I seek beside Itachi under his father because of anything further than knowing if I must fight- and as an Uchiha I must be a shinobi at least enough to serve under the Military Police if asked- I will do it to the utmost of my talent. For Fugaku though, as he kneels before me, I know my hands shake and my knees are weak. I lean into Itachi who wordlessly moves to support me, never letting my fingers go.

That was the moment I realized how much Fugaku would do for us Uchiha as he knelt in the dirt before his niece so far removed that no one else would even consider us related. Just a slip of a girl who hadn't even shown talent for the Sharingan, whose eyes weren't' as black as they should be. Who showed a strange potential skill anew..and he needed it like he was starving and I just had set him before an endless feast.

"Little one..I need to ask one thing. Do you think you can do this even to strangers?"

I paused, I knew my instincts. I reached for them deep in me, somehow the answer slipping forth. "To everyone. But..Fugaku-sama.." I paused before I let the words slip out, so terrified I would take away the light suddenly in his eyes. The almost insane look of a man with hope finally. "It seems to also keep me from lying.." It came out inflected with shame. I could not help it though the stoic nature was the pride of our clan. I was ashamed that I could not lie, I could omit or mislead but I could not lie to a direct question. My parents had never questioned it but to a kunoichi it could be lethal. It was a warning. I would not assume I knew Fugaku's plans but I needed him to know I could not lie.

"Can you stay silent?"

"To any not my clan head so long as you or your heir are in it's place, I think so."

There was a sudden shadow, emotions, to Fugaku at my honest confession and I felt Itachi's hand slip out only to wrap from my fingers, instead his arm around my shoulders. We were proud, we Uchiha. And my line was direct to the Fire Lord. That I confessed my open weakness as a sense of pride to my clan head, my devotion and affection so openly was richly passionate. We Uchiha felt so deeply after all.

Fugaku said nothing. Itachi's arm tight around my shoulder's, and Fugaku's eyes so dark and gleaming with emotion though said it for them. I had spoken my heart. Fugaku was more than a very very distant uncle to my bloodline. Fugaku was my clan head, and I had no desire to hide anything from him. I hadn't said our Hokage, I had named him. So indirectly he would understand it was not just him as the man, but his office, his station that weighed on him so heavily as long as it was held by him or the one holding me. They were my clan heads, no matter what the future held and the elders did.

I loved them. And I said it so clearly in an Uchiha fashion that it was a vow. We took such things so seriously. I named not my family, I named them.

I was Uchiha, Doriimu.

"Say it in such a way we can know, Doriimu-chan and I will explain what I can either way." Fugaku couldn't have missed my tremble or how I broke my eyes from his dark gaze to stare at the ground as I collected myself. That he offered to explain to just a child not even graduated yet..not of his direct line. It was humbling and I had to compose myself. The two ninja let me and I took a soft deep breath before I met his gaze, reaching deep down into my heart praying for only the utmost truth beyond whatever I knew to be true, to emerge. I would not let them down. Not when he had given me so much of his time which he did not do even for his newborn son Sasuke. I saw far more of Fugaku-sama even than his wife did save for when he slept I was certain.

"Fugaku-sama.." I paused, letting the words come forth, begging them with all the dark passion, the fanned flames that we Uchiha were so lethal with in our nature. They could burn and destroy or warm and inspire. I sought the darkness of our fires blessed by Amaretsu in my very soul to bare the truth of all I was for the sake of the man who was so much more than a clan head to me, for the one whose arm stayed tight around me though he was so far above me. "I pledge to you and Itachi only truth. I can stay silent but not always carefully direct. But not to you two. Never to you for what you have given me, I have only all of myself to gift back."

Fugaku paused, then stood and chuckled, a rare affectionate smile on his face as he stroked the hair off my face. "It is a pity that such a skill would be inconvenient for a clan head to have in a wife.."

Unspoken, and it did amuse me how Itachi's arm spasmed, was that otherwise he'd likely have us engaged before the hour ended and I couldn't help my blush as I looked down.

"I rather hoped to graduate before considering a future arrangement."

Fugaku actually laughed, a sign of whatever my gift was doing to relieve his burden. "Well perhaps by then my mind will change..or Itachi's."

I couldn't help but blink up over my shoulder at the silent sparring partner of mine, his arm still tight around my shoulders. He looked at me stoic and silent and I couldn't help but chuckle. Poor Itachi. I heard he only had a girlfriend at our age because she'd essentially tricked him into agreeing they were together on a shopping trip when he had just been escorting her to be polite. He was too kind to publicly shame her so the assumptions had spread.

"I wouldn't wish you to feel you had to do anything your heart didn't want, Itachi-san."

Itachi just nodded at me, as close as we were I could feel the slow exhale he gave in lieu of a sigh and fought another smile. He was relaxed though knowing especially at this moment that I clearly never spoke anything but the truth. Indeed, his and Fugaku's dark eyes were clearly replaying every interaction we had ever had to realize I never lied. It just..didn't work. I hated the feeling of slime and thick sludge and wrongness when I would that would seem to suffocate me until I gave up even attempting so I never did.

But I could remain silent.

Now I just had to learn how to be certain I could do so no matter what.


	5. Forsaken 2

Gaara was not raised alone, instead it was decided by the council that there was a need for a way that could control the one tail if need be. So they created one. Sute has been raised knowing she would one day wed Gaara, to try and give him a weakness. It backfired on the elders.

()()()()()

Shortly after they created the Ichibi Jinchinkuri they realized there was a problem with the seal. The addition that should have allowed them to control the vessel easily had instead created an instability. All attempts to kill the child without the kazekage knowing and try with a new one failed. By easily being obliterated by an unaware infant or his protective father.

The idea first came to one of the elders when he passed the nursery and observed that despite the fear, Gaara did suckle from a civilian wet nurse and hadn't killed her.

So if started early enough, there was a chance.

"Kazekage..we need to talk.." The elder was one of the most silent. He was to represent the healers, the medics. The poison and antidote experts though he had never found an apprentice. Only his Kazekage understood how valuable he was in this land, and his long time companion and former teammate (with him as the jounin leader and her a genin) Chiyo but even she called him a meddling idiot these days.

"...All right." It was saying a great deal that Rasa knew to never dismiss his most eccentric of elders. The old man had long since given up his name and was now just known as Nanashi. Of no name, it was a tradition for the ranking poison expert to give up their identity. Once all the elders were required to do so to better serve Suna and not themselves.

"Concerning.." Nanashi paused, then proceeded. He did not care that his deliberate change of what he would have said would be noted. "Your son. He is already only able to have his powers subdued by yourself. I propose we create a weakness. One that in the future may reach him when nothing else will."

"What did you have in mind."

"You were gentled by your wife."

A raised eyebrow was the answer. Rasa steepled his fingers in front of him and his eyes darkened, thinking rapidly. He was Kazekage not just for his power after all. There was merit. His marriage had been arranged and fortunately turned into love, but before that had been familiarity. Comfort.

"You wish to groom someone for him. He may still kill any other infant."

"In this, we must appeal to his nature as a child, even if he is a weapon. The idea of alienating him from everyone else is still fine, but if we cannot control him someday it would mean Suna's destruction. You may live a long time, hopefully as old as I am now Rasa..but if not.."

The Kazekage nodded.

"Find a suitable child. Orphan."

Nanashi smirked. "For the right qualities, we may need to create one.."

There was no answer. After all, it was for the good of Suna.

Nanashi still had many connections being the poison expert he was. A few trades of a rare scorpion venom that could not be duplicated, and there were several children delivered to a nearby village that he went to inspect.

All of them were similar in age, the idea being to raise them alongside Gaara before he consciously became untrusting of any strangers. Each had parents that were low to mid ranking shinobi and had decent looks they would probably grow into. The experiments in introducing them to Gaara, by having them in the same room as the now six month old..

It was a good thing they _had_ been orphans.

They tried more.

It seemed some lasted longer than others and they made note of it, the quite ones, the bubbly.. the loud all types did not last long. He did not seem to care what color of hair or eyes not that it would take much. They were looking for the connections. They brought in older children as well, just looking for what set Gaara off.

There was nothing they seemed to have in common.

Rasa stumbled across the solution one day when the wet nurse had returned, still afraid of the red headed heir she had been taking care of for a year and was resigned to her possible fate having simply stipulated in her contract that her children were to be taken care of if she died. Her husband was out on missions and was no guarantee of his survival but she was just a common civilian. Her two eldest children were in the academy already but her youngest usually was left with a neighbor. Rasa only knew this because he had promised to always let her leave early enough to collect the newborn, it was why she had milk to share with Gaara after all. It was a blessing to find anyone willing to nurse his youngest child, especially for the longer length of time so that it would help build up their chakra channels further.

That day..and perhaps some before, she could not get anyone to watch her child and had brought it along.

Rasa's eyes narrowed, hidden in the shadows as he was as he watched the wet nurse go to dispose of the soiled cloth she'd burped his babe with. Her own slightly younger child had been left nearby but out of reach. Gaara ignored them.

Until the smaller babe giggled and flopped over, wriggling hands and feet like a perfectly normal non shinobi baby.

Gaara kept ignoring them after a single look.

Rasa watched, waiting to interfere, to prevent the sure carnage.

Nothing happened.


	6. Forsaken 3

Several times in the next few months the nanny could not have anyone available to watch her baby and smuggled it in with her. No one ever said anything because the very idea of willingly bringing a child near the bloodthirsty creature that was the Kazekage's youngest was simply ludicrous. Each time now Rasa would make a point of being hidden, able to watch and wait.

It was no different.

Just a regular baby that cried sometimes, giggled most the rest and drooled on everything in sight.

Everything that the others had done and been killed for.

One day the sand did slip about when the nurse went to fetch the snacks, Gaara secure in his crib. Not that it meant much, as a ninja child Gaara had been escaping his crib for months. Still his nanny was a civilian so she apparently thought nothing of it. Nor did her particular spawn act any different than a civilian.

But that day, when the smaller child fell trying to stand -Rasa was fairly certain civilians took a bit longer to do that but he wasn't precisely fond of most of them to the point of interacting with their children, just protecting the village as a whole- the sand was there. Preparing to gather chakra Rasa hesitated just a moment to see what would happen.

The sand wrapped around the child's left wrist but instead of crying the babe laughed and swatted at it with a happy shriek. Gaara did nothing else to react. Not even when the smaller child began trying to slobber all over the sand layer, apparently happy to gum it.

Interesting.

Rasa waited until the nanny was back and then stepped out. Gaara's sharp eyes (too sharp and too bright) locked onto his father's but he made no move. The predator recognizing a larger one.

The sand slithered out, a hissing sibilant noise that did not scare the younger child.

"Oh! Kazekage-sama.." the nanny splutters as she re-enters. "Forgive me I.."

Rasa holds up a hand to silence her. Silent, wary, watching. Gaara has his sand out but not yet attacking.

The utter lack of noise save for the shifting grains of sand keeps Rasa on edge before finally there's a spluttering spitting sound and the smaller child reaches for the sparkling grains, and flops onto it's belly. Gaara does not break eye contact but the sand shifts, blocking the child from sight.

Rasa nods. "I'm not taking them away."

The eyes are like the mirage of an oasis in their brilliance against Gaara's skin. The boys shockingly red hair in contrast.

Rasa backs away and the sand fades, a few grains left on the floor and with the smaller child trying to shove them into it's mouth only to spit them out. None of the high level of intelligence shown by Gaara is present.

"A word with you." Rasa inclines his head to the nurse and leads her to his office. Gaara is in his crib, and the child seems content to leave puddles of slobber on his floor.

There's babbling apologies and Rasa finally cuts the nanny off. "Family name and how long has your child been in contact with Gaara?"

"Fumei" The last name is forgettable, less than important. Still he recognizes it as one of his shinobi. A chunin if he recalls, one almost always in the field for dangerous work as he has a knack for infiltration. Rasa makes a note to look up information on him.

"I'm sorry Sute has never seemed to bother Gaara and she.."

Rasa holds up his hand eyes sharp.

It seems that what they were looking for may just be in his lap.

"Your..daughter, has never caused a reaction?"

"No."

"Even though you are clearly terrified of him and children generally reflect what their parents do."

"That would be my husbands fault. It's something of a family trait that even if they can use chakra they don't sense it. It's complicated but I never understood when he tried to explain it.."

The words spark a reminder. Fumei Han. Indeed one of his chunin, with what is called the "Chakra Null" technique. Apparently a very low level bloodline trait. He hides his chakra absolutely as an unconscious method or smothers it to a forgettable civilian level that can be maintained day and night for long stretches; and it allows him to slip in and out of places. Hence he is always out spying.

"And your children carry this?"

"My eldest does, my two middle children do not ...and we hadn't..I mean, Sute is rather young to find out and with my husband away..."

If she cannot sense and hides her chakra naturally than it would make sense that Gaara would not be troubled by her. The final puzzle piece slips into place. All the previous children were afraid. With her mother there and unable to sense the overwhelming chakra, Sute did not fear the weapon of Suna. Naturally her own chakra hidden she also wouldn't register as a threat.

Indeed...the perfect solution.

Rasa gives permission for her to bring the child more often.


	7. Forsaken 4

AN: These came out more drabble style which is not my usual method so I lumped them together more.

Sute does not crawl. She rather..rolls to where she wants to get. Gaara does not watch her often, but when he does it's very much like an animal observing something in it's space. He is walking early, and using his sand to get his way. One day Sute has managed to roll almost within reach and as Gaara stares into nothing she gnaws on one of the rubber shuriken left out for teething. Her own is a teething ring, but she seems to like the shuriken.

Rasa notices this in passing, his eyes of course seeing that Gaara is fully aware of his father and watching his every move. He doesn't seem to care that Sute is chewing on something that is his.

Despite Gaara rarely doing anything it seems Sute is quite happy to be in his company and Rasa has hopes that Gaara is not such a failure of a seal. Perhaps he can be used without being a danger to the village.

()()()()()

It is almost a year, a year of Rasa and his best guards- ones who are so weak they will not register as a threat to Gaara, yet unreservedly loyal to the point Rasa would take them over a dozen Anbu- before Rasa is convinced that little Sute is safe.

Gaara has not once reacted negatively. Nor does he react positively save for the occasional wrap of sand around the child to amuse her, or help steady her when she careens into something going too fast for her tiny form. It is far more than they had come to be hopeful for. Rasa leaves a message for Fumei Han to report to him immediately when he returns from his current mission. This is best approached directly, and not through the twists of his elders.

After all, Rasa would rather that the shackle they wish to chain to his son is willing. That will not occur if her parents are killed off to ensure her complacency.

()()()()()

It takes almost no time. Han is a very loyal shinobi, one that if not so perfectly forgettable would likely have his place guarding Rasa himself. However, the chakra null gift is priceless and it is in large part thanks to his loyal jounin that Suna knows which villages have a grudge against their competitors. Easiest to sweep in and steal their contracted hits and jobs that way, coming out looking like gleaming alabaster without a flaw on them.

Sute's father signs the betrothal contract before she has hit two years old.

Rasa arranges for a change in plans before he tells the elders. It is just that he has succeeded in the scheme they tried to concoct, of course.

()()()()()

He will not traumatize the boy in the ways that were planned to ascertain his danger levels if it comes to that. Nor will he directly threaten Sute for he doesn't wish Gaara to realize the child is a weakness until he doesn't wish to be rid of the familiar.

No, for now, they will just wait.


	8. Yin and Yang 1

Assume nothing. Female Jiraiya from the idea of what if you stopped watching Naruto before you really learned anything and then were reincarnated? You know the AU craziness by now.

()()()()()()()

"Now what." It was curt and frustrated and Orochimaru's voice was practically a huff of irritation as someone pounded on the door. The orphanage was half full, but some rooms were permitted to be alone. Growling slightly at the interruption of his book, the young boy hopped down from his bed to go open the door.

It was really not a surprise when a white spikey haired form rushed in giggling and so the pale boy simply closed the door again, lifting a brow.

"Thanks." With that the shirt was lifted and from where they'd jury rigged a sort of pouch with another shirt that was far too large under neath and flopped around from taking the bottom up and into the top a few times came a package.

"Mmm." Orochimaru's bad mood had fled when he'd recognized Jiraiya. There were _plenty_ in the orphanage he could not stand. But he had never managed to scowl or frighten away the other child. "Was it hard?" He was curious, always curious. His brain screamed for influx of information at all times even more than his body needed oxygen. They were only a year into the academy and looking ahead in older students books had shown tips on thievery. Jiraiya had been the one brave enough to go into the market and try it out.

"Yeah, but I think mostly because I was nervous. I kept trying not to be like you told me though.." Finally the shirt untwisting was done and one half of the spoils were handed over, the two children sitting on the ground. It didn't seem like much but apples and chocolate were both rare treats in a poor orphanage where over cooked rice and vegetables was most of what they ate. Even bits of tofu and fish were rare, and the one time they'd had red meat at a school festival all the orphanage children were sick. They weren't used to the richness. Chocolate though, a tiny bit here and there was worth it as they _never_ got sweets.

The apple was heavenly. Orochimaru closed his eyes as he leaned against the wall across from Jiraiya. It was perfectly ripe and juicy, negating the need for water. Beside him Jiraiya was savoring an apple but they'd both only have a bite of chocolate before hiding them. It wasn't the first time they'd stolen of course but it was the very first time it had been planned.

Silence fell for a while before after eating all but the stem, Orochimaru grabbed his book and brought it over, fingers flipping back to an early part. "Read."

"The..tra..trag.."

"Trajectory."

"huh?"

"Angle."

"Okay..the trajeectoni of the kunai.."

Slowly Jiraiya formed the words, eyes fixed on each character. It was hard, very hard. Orochimaru though was patient, as perhaps he would not have been otherwise. Perhaps not if Jiraiya had been what she remembered Jiraiya as. Not that she had ever finished the first season. She'd stopped at crazy Gaara and a sand invasion but had seen Orochimaru was a freaky dude when he bit Sasuke. So when she ended up here, in the body of a baby and the name of a character she did the only thing she could. Assume she knew nothing and move on.

It was kind of nice, not remembering how she died or even when. She didn't remember a lot and even less about the show, so really overall maybe it was a good thing. All she remembered of Jiraiya had been something about seals and toads and watermelons. All she knew of Orochimaru was he was creepy and bit little boys.

All the other characters were ones she may never get to see, and since she was a little girl and not a boy, she threw any delving deep beyond those snippets out the window. She actually thought her english and science classes may be a lot more useful to try and remember. Certainly biology..

So she'd embraced life as Jiraiya with one thing, she hid her gender. It wasn't hard really as children looked the same above the waist most their life until puberty so keeping her hair short and spikey and in the castoff clothing they were given she just didn't add any skirts. Out of sight, literally out of mind.

Being that she was Jiraiya, she had no assumptions on behavior or ideas. She knew later on from her friends who stayed in the fandom and exposed her to their chatter that he was apparently a pervert and wrote perverted books that Kakashi read. The rest was a nice blur.

And she didn't like toads.

So she was her own person and it didn't matter.

"Now this page." Orochimaru shifted it and she nodded.

"When making the stance you need to always balance.."

Helping her learn to read even if it was his awful dry technical books had been a kindness from the darker haired boy. She wasn't sure why, but didn't ask. Maybe it was because they were the only smart ones in the orphanage ate an age most were eating glue, perhaps because they were two of many trying to be ninja to make something of themselves.

Orochimaru liked to take things apart and figure them out, Jiraiya liked to look at them and figure out how to fit things together and get it done.

They didn't trail after each other so much as just always go together. Where one was, so was the other. They had been like that for months now and if apart it was always just what happened not a planned separation.

"Want to go out?" Jiraiya asked when Orochimaru was putting his book away. The pale boy looked at her, and then at the darkening window curious. They'd skipped dinner as it wasn't their turn tonight. The orphanage had very little, and unless they just wanted rice there wasn't anything else their group would get that evening. Tomorrow they would, and so the stolen apple really had been a good thing. Slowly he nodded.

"Where?"

Jiraiya paused, hands stretching over her before she shrugged, going to open the window. They snuck out all the time, the old building made it easy enough to find hand holds. "Library?"

Orochimaru's face lit up and he nodded, the two dropping to the ground soon. Both had grasped the lessons very swiftly from the academy because they were skills they could use _now_ to escape and get around. Silence was a blessing when you needed to be stealthy. Without a word the two slipped out, by way of the park. It wouldn't be the first time they hid in the library until it closed, or even reopened. On nights where the full moon was out Orochimaru would be absorbed in his reading and Jiraiya would fall asleep near him when she finished her own. They'd sneak out at first light to go to the academy where for the early orphans there would be a humble breakfast waiting.

It was part of how they enticed orphans to go, it may be humble but the rations were greater than the orphanage. Jiraiya had shuddered the first time she realized what that meant.

Conditioning.

Find children who wouldn't have wanted to be ninja, even if they had potential, by luring them in from a basic need.

It worked. No that Jiraiya and Orochimaru would have ever not wanted to be ninja. It was the only way to make something of yourself in the world after all for a pair of no name strange looking kids. Normal looking ones might find a trade or work at shops. For the unusual sort? Ninja was the only place the weirder you looked the more you fit in.

Orochimaru had just smirked the first time Jiraiya pouted about his neater markings.

It was entirely unlikely either had clan relatives anywhere and if so they'd died out before Konoha, mere trickles of legacy out in the world. It was the way things were.


	9. Yin and Yang 2

The years went easily. Jiraiya learned to henge as soon as they could and pleaded Orochimaru to help ensure it was a good one. Only once positive she could hold a male form if needed when the mandatory graduation year physicals would occur -thankfully still years off and done by civilian medics for the orphans who didn't have clan secrets to conceal- did she pull Orochimaru off to the park as usual.

He couldn't complain. He had an adoration of making clones that was nuts and used Jiraiya to help inspect them. Getting the back of a clone to match was a lot harder than it seemed.

"So what is it?" Orochimaru's expression was flat, bored. It was the typical one. Jiraiya half expected this to not be a shock to her friend at all but had to inform him anyways. Especially because they'd been having a fight about how even with Oro teaching her to read and write she was not putting out effort in class. Something that he could not understand.

"Something only you are gonna know. The matron's never bothered to ask.." Jiraiya rubbed her ear but looked at him. If you didn't meet Oro's eyes he got funny. "I'm a girl."

Orochimaru opened his mouth to refute it..and then paused. Slowly his eyes trailed over her face, the spikey hair kept so short and the clothing. He crossed his arms and noted that Jiraiya was just waiting. Not even anxiously, trusting him to draw his own conclusions as always. It was nice to have someone understand your brain was vastly superior.

"You always did refuse to mingle like the cretins or bathe in the river in summer.." And with that he simply accepted it. The yellow gaze sharp again, waiting.

"Typical Oro, I mention that and you figure it's gotta be something important.."

"Am I wrong?"

Jiraiya smiled. No he wasn't. "I'm barely passing on purpose. I checked the old records in the library, I'll show you. When graduating they do the teams based on grades. One is always the best kunoichi and ninja, one the worst. All the teams vary then for an even mix of good and bad so they can work on each others weaknesses."

Orochimaru blinked once.

"There's only one kunoichi slot per team..but two chances for us to pair up if they think you're a boy..."

"And let's face it you're insanely smart and I am not up to that level even if I went for the girl's part so the only option I have is to be the dead last in class..which if I only do the last year is going to be suspicious."

Orochimaru tilted his head and actually giggled. "That's halfway intelligent of you."

The thank you was unsaid.


	10. Yin and yang 3

Orochimaru was a stoic and slightly twisted potentially psychopathic nut but Jiraiya was always there to explain things and it said a lot about the world they lived in that her mind was content to not flinch at the needing of explaining..

"What's the issue if I'm trying to dissect the bird anyways? I want to know how it is put together!"

"Because it was still alive." Jiraiya explained, swinging her legs off the bench they were sitting on outside the orphanage. They'd been kicked out for the night, a fairly common thing when the workers got irritated with some of the kids. The idea was sleeping on the streets would make them more complacent for a while. Orochimaru had been livid the first few times, but Jiraiya was good at making contacts and getting information and had learned from some of the older kids who really stayed on the streets where was safe to go. It helped she'd gotten pretty good at sneak thieving and at least if not a blanket they each had a nice warm jacket she'd snuck back in and yoinked from the orphanage caretakers closets for themselves.

"Well of course it was alive. I need to see how the heart beat changes things and what muscles move.."

"Oro."

Orochimaru paused and looked over, scowl still in place but waiting for Jiraiya to try and explain it to him.

"It's because it was alive and in pain, people see that and it makes them squirm because they emphasize. They picture themselves in that position and it makes them scared of you."

"Empathize, wrong word Jiraiya..and I like them scared of me."

"No, you like the idea of power. But even a rabid dog gets fear. You want respect and with your brain you will get it." Jiraiya watched as Oro shifted and grumbled but finally nodded.

"I can make certain they are dead for a while first..for now."

"I'll start looking into ways to knock things unconscious. If you _have_ to see them alive can you wait until I get good at that? Think about it if it was me on there and I was screaming would it bother you?"

Orochimaru looks away from her eyes, silent. Perhaps someone else would recoil at the lack of response but Jiraiya saw the twitch of his shoulders as he hunches in.

Oro won't admit it, but the idea bothers him and she can see that.

Jiraiya sighs and then leans over, head on his shoulder. "People who hurt others that are helpless worry people, Oro. The world doesn't think as you do, you always say it is too stupid to do so. Don't jeopardize your future because people are scared you don't know when to stop."

Orochimaru had never given thought to people not trusting him as a ninja some day when the graduate because they fear what he would do in the pursuit of knowledge. Of course he has limits! For the first time though he pauses and looks to the side at the spikey white hair poking into his neck. If Jiraiya didn't risk his temper, though not so much these days as he's learned Jiraiya isn't saying no but this is why it's a no..

If people _had_ held his hunger for knowledge against him, shunned him and cornered him for it. Maybe there wouldn't be a limit to that. Because he still had trouble understanding why everyone around him wasn't always asking why. At least for all her idiocy in many ways Jiraiya was often just as curious..if about other things.

"You'll always tell me when to stop."

Jiraiya shifts to smile at him, it's the smug one that she's copied from him and has none of the elegance that Orochimaru manages. No, from Jiraiya it's all brutish and uncouth and yet..

It suits her.

There's no artifice to Jiraiya when she smiles like that.

"And if I don't, I'll at least tell you why I wish you would." There's a pledge there, a nebulous future that makes Oro close his yellow eyes because _Jiraiya sees it too!_

War will be back some day and while their year mates stay oblivious to playing ninja and thinking it is all protecting people and Konoha is Wonderful...there's always a darker side. Just like them. Yin and Yang.

"I'll listen."

"Yeah." She doesn't question him and Orochimaru smirks because Jiraiya knows when he says something he means it.


	11. Yin and Yang 4

The years pass.

The Academy is no challenge and Orochimaru is a natural at ninjutsu and genjutsu. He consumes knowledge and books with a lust that is almost perverse even on a child that young. He craves it to no end.

Jiraiya is a bit of a goof, but it's in wry humor and subtle ways. Jiraiya is called charming and has a knack for reading people that Oro does not. He still hates that she shortens his name to Oro but at least it isn't Oro-kun. Only once does he call her Aya. The fight they have is vicious and gets them bumped up in learning better taijutsu though so it was worth the resulting black eye and angry looks. Jiraiya's temper though is a swift thing, flaring up and then forgiven as soon as Orochimaru can manage an apology.

Orochimaru on the other hand holds grudges.

Not to Jiraiya though. Because Jiraiya has thrown herself into her lock picking and trap making skills, into every bit of subterfuge and infiltration art she can that they teach and goes to after hours tutoring for it. The results are that they have clothing that fits and food most the time. In learning to be a con artist Jiraiya masters charm and is definitely a budding actor of rare skill.

The fan girls they both have are a nightmare, though Orochimaru's aren't numerous because they find him creepy too..and Jiraiya is still trying to figure out why she has them.

Orochimaru takes far too much pleasure in teasing her that she apparently does well pretending to be a boy and has forgotten to be a girl.

The next day when he's reading in the library a cute little girl sits by him and it's not until she asks if he is hungry and procures lunch that Orochimaru does a double take. Because it's apples and chocolate which has become their favorite and only one person knows that.

The spikes are smoothed out and curled in a way that shows it was actually done by hand, going from shoulder length to her jaw now with soft looking curls that resemble a lamb on her head with a henge providing a lighter skin tone and her hair a gentle blonde. There's a dusting of rice powder that hides her tear markings and her outfit is a sundress in lilac rather than Jiraiya's usual grays and browns. She has flats on rather then ninja sandals and smiles at him in a more subdued manner.

Orochimaru laughs so hard he nearly falls out of his chair but concedes that she is better than he thought.

As they wander that day, with him calling her Aya-chan and she can't do anything about it..he would worry that someone would guess except that ninja are rather terrible at looking beyond the obvious and Jiraiya is not acting as uncouth as usual. She's being very demure and cute and sweet and almost acting shy. It's a brilliant use of the henge, so subtle as it's just in coloring that it doesn't even register as using chakra really. Hence the rice powder and the curling of her hair done in what she reveals was a boring way of wetting it and using diluted starch glue and pencils to get the curls to actually stay put.

It's very strange though at ten to see other boys actually looking at his best (only) friend like they do all the cute girls.

He even tells her as much when they are back in the orphanage, their room because eventually it just became _theirs_ and Orochimaru scared off anyone else who tried to bunk with the two 'boys'. He doesn't even remember when it was that Jiraiya just started sleeping in one of the other three beds there and it became her room as much as his. It wasn't like they really owned anything to keep in it usually.

"Eh? They thought I was cute?" Jiraiya makes such a face..a sneer with a wrinkled nose and squinted eyes that Orochimaru snickers.

"Not like that right now you look more constipated and about to sneeze."

Jiraiya shrugs, then pouts at him. It's so common Orochimaru just waits for the complaint that is sure to come.

"You're still prettier."

He denies that he blushes even as he feels his entire face and ears warm.

Still the fan girls never truly approach but it is strangely amusing to see them hover, clearly just as enthralled at the two such opposite best friends being near. They really are so different, and yet so very alike.

Yin and Yang.


	12. Root2

"You feel no pain, because the pain is a product of the mind. It is a signal. A warning. You may choose to ignore it. Indeed, you must." Came the soft drone as Danzo stepped slowly around his stage in the vast room elevated above them. Eimin had her head bowed, hair in a tight sleek knot at the top of her head as she focused intensely on his words. On all sides of her were others. If the hair was long it was pulled up like hers to not get in the way. All of them were kneeling, eyes down, bodies held so motionless that pins and needles would travel along them. They had been here a long time already.

"In pain there is a clouding of the mind. A flinch of a reaction may lead you to jeopardizing the mission." Danzo continued. Each time he reached the end of the dias he would return back the other way. A constant circling vulture eying his ranks. They had most lectures like this or in other poses. Training to hold still, to obey, to push beyond discomfort.

There was no member who was as silent, as motionless as one of Root. It was a source of pride they were allowed. In Danzo, in Root, they carved the few emotions they were permitted.

Indeed there were exceptions to every one of the emotions that supposedly were purged from them. Aggression was the only one that was always handled. Because it simply could not be ruled properly. Bloodlust had no place.

"Recite." Danzo's hand made a sound as it moved through the air compared to the utter stillness in the room. There was a crashing wave as one the many took a breathe and began.

 _In Root, you have no name. You have no feelings. You have no past. You have no future. There is only the mission._

()()()()()()()

Eimin's eyes snapped open as she roused from the dream. That had been a few years ago, and her last mission from Danzo never ceased haunting her. She knew her body had woken automatically after a few hours for her turn at watch. Standing she moved silently to replace her partner. Cat moved to join the others, in slumber right away as she took up watch. She was actually just now turning eleven. The age so many would graduate, yet they all thought her maybe a year or two older and here she was in a white mask with a fish's face on it. Technically it was a koi, complete with whiskers. She should be a frog as technically she was part of the frog division but they were happy to give her a fish and joke about it.

She didn't understand, but that was okay.

She was the youngest of the frog division, not the youngest in Anbu there were a fair number of them all in the lowest rungs waiting to move up. All beyond exceptional in some way. It was not for them, completing the academy. They were the 'drop outs' and failures so that no one thought anything of them seeming to vanish from the world most the time. Anbu had few ties. What ties they did have were to their cell, their team.

"Koi."

Eimin did not move. There was a chuckle, and then her superior in one of the many frog masks was there before her, his hands flashed and she knew the frog division's infamous secrecy jutsu was in place. No one would hear or see what was said in there, and time slowed ever so slightly. It had to be _earned_ along with a place in Frog Division's ranks. There was a secondary tattoo, inked on her pelvis that went far deeper than flesh into muscle and laced with chakra that could not be faked. You had to have the mark to use the jutsu, shrouded as it was in secrets it worked very similar to the seal on her tongue. She _knew_ things as Koi that she never could tell save to a Frog or the Hokage himself. That she could not pass that on to Danzo was irrelevant and so she never focused on it.

"Tadpole." It was the term for the younger members, for all they gave her a fish moniker, something about being the little fish in a big pond that went over her head...and an endearing term. Koi was something of the doll of the entire Anbu medic nin division.

"Taichou." She tilted her head, curious as to why he was out there. She still _felt_ after all, she just didn't always understand expressing such or why she was to act in some ways. Curiosity though was one she knew very well. "Mission proceeding well. Mild poison on target did not match previous sample."

"Neither did the other two." Toad looked away for a moment, as she did, checking the surroundings before he continued. "We are still waiting to hear back from the still proceeding missions if their targets have the concoction. If not we will be forced to deal with the nin." It was fairly normal. Someone had developed a very complex slow acting wasting poison and hit a wealthy noble with it to demand money for the cure. Rather then be bullied, the man was paying for a lot of missions to track down any and all leads as to whom this free agent could have used. Rather then paying and losing face however, the next step after having tracked down the scattered group that had attacked the noble man's carriage when the administering of poison occurred would be to confront the one demanding the funds and persuade them otherwise. Usually there was more body disposal involved on those missions. Eimin's particular jutsu was very handy in these occasions.

"understood."

"You will be stopping in a village on the way back as usual, it is the last location the blackmailer was seen. If you see him you have personal orders to break off and incapacitate for information."

"Hai." She accepted the special scroll that was handed to her, and a second one that was sealed to pass to her current squad leader pardoning her in advance if she fled the area. She would not be the one doing the interrogation of course as there was time to transport them to konoha for proper methods to be utilized.

Frog left shortly after and it was just a moment..but there was another Anbu there. One that made a tingling flow across her tongue.

 _There is only the mission._

It seemed Danzo had sent someone after all.


	13. Next Time

AN: Thank you to those who let me know I accidentally posted Root2 twice. I'm not sure why it did that. Since I do not have 3 ready, have another unrelated idea that was spawned as a challenge. FemaleSasuke. Because it does change EVERYTHING when you're a girl. This jumps around a bit.

()()()()()()()

Sasuke was the 'spare' child. The second. The one because Mikoto had wanted a child out of love not just duty. Although she had been teased by her year mates in private during play dates about her name, no one older said anything to her face.

She had no idea why she was named after a father to a Hokage. She knew better than to ask such things of her parents. While little boys could run around and yell and goof off, she could not. She was always permitted to work on her skills to be a splendid Shinobi Kunoichi in the future but anything else must adhere to decorum.

It drove Sasuke crazy.

"Can't you do something about her hair, Mikoto?" her father would sigh, frowning at the unruly spikes it was so prone to and making Sasuke flush.

"She has my hair, Fugaku. Until it grows out there is nothing we can do about it."

Or the lovely exchanges about her attire that seemed to be a constant.

"Sasuke-chan, go put on the yukata I laid out for you!" or "Where are you going dressed like that?"

Training was the _only_ acceptable answer to the last one. That also only applied as long as it was in the compound. Outside of it at all times she was to look like a little lady. No matter that it was hardly useful. It wasn't as if she'd be fighting in a full kimono some day! You could barely walk in them!

"It's not fair." She'd dared to grumble once with her face hidden in Itachi's sleeve as they were ignored. The adults would talk about them but not to them. Itachi constantly being pressured to work harder, improve more. Graduate soon even though he had yet to attend the classes as his enrollment had been delayed so he didn't start in the middle of the year. Something about auspicious days and such that she paid no attention to even with her name involved.

"...Sorry, Sasuke-chan." Itachi would whisper and she'd look up, black eyes meeting black and her hands would loosen their grip on his garment a little. Because her older brother was there and he liked her just fine.

It was Itachi who had made time for her. Even when he looked exhausted, he forced himself to perform a little slower than the clan harassed him for insisting that the speed of an accomplishment held little compared to the expanse of mastery. He'd had to fiddle with the truth, Sasuke only knew because Itachi told her in strict secrecy. She was good at keeping her outbursts in, she could certainly not tell a secret!

Itachi had made them think he was taking his time so he could blast _every_ record at the academy not just pass. With that in mind two to three years instead of part of the first was tolerable. That he would receive flawless scores _and_ graduate ahead of time would be a permanent coup for the Uchiha and they eased off.

The real reason though was because Sasuke had asked for help. Being that the clan decided her end purpose once graduation and genin was complete was mostly to be put in an advantageous marriage and have children like her mother had, Mikoto being an anomaly having reached jounin they did not pressure her for how far to reach. Chunin would be entirely satisfactory and Jounin a feather in the cap but not needed. Not for the spare child.

They didn't count on Sasuke's pride.

She refused to be just 'the second child' or 'the girl.' It rankled her to be judged by her gender and lit a fire in her soul to surpass all their expectations. Or as she'd whispered to Itachi one night as he held her on the roof to stargaze.

"I want to see how far I can go..I want to find out who Sasuke is besides just a title and a dress."

"I understand." Itachi had too. He didn't need long explanations. From Itachi when training or even just a few moments as he rested and could lecture, she learned not to waste movement or energy or prolong a battle.

"It is in those moments you lose. Battle, war, death. None of this is glamorous or pleasant, Sasuke." And that was the other thing. Itachi left off the endearments when they trained. As if he looked beyond her being his little sister. Sibling. Sasuke was just another hopeful trying to be a shinobi. "I've seen it..when you were just a baby and the nine tails attacked. I couldn't get the smell out of my mind for months. I saw people suffering and no one able to heal them, lingering crying deaths where their comrades couldn't issue a mercy kill. So yes, I will train you to kill Sasuke not to fight. To end the battle as swiftly as you can. At every moment you must be in full control so that if your objective changes you can halt your attack even to the last second."

It was very different from what she had been learning from her mother and the academy.

These were not katas and forms or mindless target practice. This was multiple targets and precision and learning to fight handicapped and at any moment Itachi could show up and tap her and she'd know it was a killing blow. Not that anyone else would have seen it. His favorite was to poke her in the forehead whenever her guard was down.

"You cannot afford to ever not be alert, Sasuke."

"Better luck next time, Sasuke." That was praise. Because when Itachi said that, or just simply 'Next time' he meant she's improving. Not that in all these years their parents had figured it out.

()()()()()()

"I'm sorry Itachi can't play dear one.." Mikoto said as Itachi walked away after poking Sasuke in her forehead, the baby girl of the family puffing out her cheeks and half pouting half upset. Clearly she was feeling left alone.

"...It's okay Okaa-san. I know he has things to work on." She had her arms still crossed and Mikoto sighed.

"Sasuke-chan you musn't make such faces."

Sasuke shuddered but then took on a blank face. Mikoto didn't like that one but she couldn't really tell her not to. It just didn't look appealing on a girl for all it was correct enough.

"Come on Sasuke-chan, you can help me make onigiri for when the men get back."

Mikoto never saw the glare that was aimed at her retreating form. It hadn't improved at all when she started going to the academy. It was as bad as if she was still in the pre-course.

()()()()()()Flashback()()()()()

"It makes no sense for me to wear a Yukata to the pre-course, Okaa-san. I cannot do any of the exercises in it." Sasuke was despairing because of course her parents weren't being rational in this. Itachi was gone, testing out of the genjutsu course though it would have no effect on him. Sasuke and Shisui were the only two who currently knew Itachi had awakened his Sharingan. She was helping him keep it a secret because if he showed it the clan wouldn't wait for him to graduate on his own terms. It had taken many nights of her and Shisui throwing everything they could at him and attacking in her clumsy way while Shisui was everywhere in order to get Itachi able to keep it turned off.

"But.."

"You are representing the clan, Sasuke-chan." Her father's voice interjected and her shoulders slumped. He had that 'I have decided tone.'

"You will wear a haori and hakama. If you cannot fight in those perhaps you are not ready to attend, even though at your age Itachi was in the proper academy not the pre-course."

Ah yes the pre-course. Something the civilian's didn't get but the three and over children who weren't yet ready for the academy could take. It gave the clan kids a heads up advantage when they began properly. Technically though Itachi hadn't started early because he had helped out around the house while her father had been on a distance mission with the Military police heads at the request of the Daimyo. It had been entirely irregular and so Itachi was in the second year at the academy at nine years old, not the youngest who would ever graduate but still substantially impressive. For being barely three so was Sasuke. She was already speaking well, able to do basic throwing and kata exercises with Itachi and he was working with her on her awareness. No child her age did that..well except Itachi but he was a generational genius.

"Yes, Otou-sama." Sasuke replied dully. Great. She had to practice in garments she wasn't familiar with non stop if she wasn't going to make a fool out of herself. It frustrated the heiress to no end. Had she just been a boy, she could have gone in shorts and no one would have said a word!

()()()()()()A few months later()()()()()()

"Congratulations!" Itachi allowed himself to be hit by the small black haired form that flung herself at him with a laugh. She'd be lectured endlessly later by the elders and parents but it pulled out a genuine smile from Itachi as he looked down at his adorable little sister. Black hair still untamed though it was growing out, held back as much as it could be after the bangs fell in the family style by a very cute white cat headband. Considering Neko-baba they couldn't fault Sasuke for wearing it. It was one of the few ways she got to be playful and Itachi thought it was precious on her.

"Thank you, Sasuke-chan." Because right now she was his little sister. He'd officially graduated, still before he wanted to, the last thing he was wishing for was a genin team and since it would soon be found out he had allowed the final test of the day, the taijutsu where he absolutely wrecked his opponent and teacher in turn, to let the sharingan activate. Right now he was 'having trouble turning it off' as that was normal, even though he'd really already been through that. It was worth it though, to have permanently seared into his memory the sight of Sasuke entirely unburdened by anything, in a navy yukata and white cat ears beaming up at him.

It helped ease the burden on his shoulders. Because Sasuke knew how dangerous he was already as he was training her whenever he could, and she could still smile at him like that.

()()()()()()()Now()()()()()()()()()()

"I'm disappointed in you Sasuke. At your age Itachi.."

It was almost worse than hearing those words. The pause. The sudden hesitation as Fugaku regarded the petite form and changed what he was going to say.

Because he didn't need his _daughter_ to strive to be as good as his _son._

The subject would always change. Her mother would offer to help her with shuriken and senbon, what the clan considered 'women's weapons'. She'd talk about common herb remedies. The academy for first years was so far even below that she'd have to accept gracefully because they wanted her to learn flower arranging in the academy. Flowers. Not even the killing sort or anything useful. The best you could hope for was 'I admire you' or the like. Sasuke had developed a habit out of class to rip up every flower she found.

Itachi was the only one who went over the anatomy charts and explained what happened when you were hit. What occurred when you had blood loss and concussions and why sometimes incapacitating was better than a kill shot. Itachi was the one who taught her, fetching her in the night as always, how to get blood out of her own clothes without leaving traces on her person and letting her practice on his before showing her how he had wrapped a scrap or small injury, often undoing it to walk her through it.

Her mother taught her to cook so she could do it for her future family.

The parallel lives drove her mad. There were days she wanted to scream at her parents, her clan elders, that she was Sasuke! It didn't matter that she was a girl she was the same stock as Itachi and why didn't they at least try to see if she could go as far! So maybe it'd take her longer, the wave would erode the mountain in time.

Again, it was only Itachi who saw _her_.

"I don't know what I'd do without you, Itachi.." She whispered one night as she sat beside him, watching the stars after he'd helped her with kunai blocks and strikes.

"You have everyone else." Itachi's voice was odd but Sasuke played it off as his being tired. He was ANBU now of all things, ANBU! At his age she'd probably be chunin but that was fine because she'd be a really good chunin about to become a jounin. She had all his old training notes he wrote down for her every year safely hidden away where their parents would never find them. Neko-baba made certain of that.

"The whole clan just sees me as the future bride of someone. I just need to make genin, maybe chunin and then have a family for them. Even okaa-san doesn't think I could go as far as she does. She doesn't even think about it.." She felt her eyes sting but would not cry. Not when she only had precious rare moments with itachi.

There was a heavy pause and then Itachi's hand ruffled her hair. The only one who would because he knew that she didn't mind it was spikey and slow to grow and troublesome. He said it made her look like a bristling kitten all spiked up in the back and so she'd secretly kept trimming it. He'd caught her once and been doing it for her since, always smiling.

He didn't smile much these days so every single one Sasuke counted as a victory kill.

"What about your friends at the academy?"

"I don't have any." She said and Itachi's hand stilled. "Really. They all just call me 'Uchiha' and the girls ignore me. They aren't serious about being good shinobi either though..and the boys .." Sasuke pouted then but told the truth. "I think everyone thinks _I_ am a boy."

"Ah. Well you don't wear yukata..so you probably seem a formal arrogant stuffy boy." Itachi's voice was deadpan but Sasuke knew his humor and rolled her eyes.

"That's fine for now. I don't think it changes me, you know?"

"I do."

Sasuke turned, black eyes meeting black as Itachi ruffled her hair again but his eyes were so serious that she kept from smiling.

"Because everyone looks at you and sees an object, like they do me. Where I am a weapon you are a chess piece to capture another, something they value more. If you were a boy father wouldn't stop his lectures and you may have grown to hate yourself, to be frustrated with your progress as they always demanded more out of you. Perhaps even to dislike me for what I have come to me naturally like so many of our clan does even as they praise me to my face..And I wouldn't have spent so much time with you. Not that I would love you less, but you would have many wishing to teach you as a heir. As I did. Much of my skill is I had the entire clan always offering me advice. You've had Okaa-san, and myself."

Sasuke frowned and shook her head slightly. "I don't see how that would be."

"I'm glad." Itachi sighed then and pulled Sasuke close where she promptly made like a limpet and clung to him happily. "Though I do wish you had friends outside the clan."

"Not like the bunch of busy bodies are going anywhere."

As much as they drove her mad, Sasuke would come to regret ever thinking that.


	14. Sakura and her Alternate Personality

AN: Let me start off saying I really dislike what was done with Canon Sakura and indeed all the girls who come across as an afterthought or in general useless save to chase boys with any growth vanishing under the development of all the males in comparison. That said I adore much of what the fandom has done to her. This idea came about because after a while we do not really see Inner Sakura and the change from the one as a little girl to the one later is exceptionally drastic. Shy gentle timid people who are introverted STAY that way usually. This is not a thing to be cured, it's just how we are. So I'm messing with Multiple Personality Disorder. The idea then got way messed up and my sister demanded I do it but no telling if I'll continue. Enjoy. Quick explanation "Regular talking" 'Inner and Outer mentally talking'

()()()()()()()

Cherry Blossoms and Wysteria.

One blooms swiftly and is highly regarded as all the more beautiful for it's moment of splendor. One is hardy and adaptable but understated in it's regal nature. In the right situation, they can thrive. In the wrong ones, they need to be transplanted or perish. Unless they can switch places. Luckily for Sakura and her other personality Fuji, they can.

()()()()()()()

The Haruno family had a kekkai genkai. It varied in strength and as most couldn't see a way it would actually be useful in battle, indeed mentioning it had always had very poor reactions, so they kept it secret. Due to the manifestation almost from the start it was something all the children had to be raised knowing you did not speak of to others. They also always had a second name so that they were at ease discussing which thought was whom in a way that would never out them if overheard.

Because the Haruno's did not just have hair in various shades of pink and mauve. They were twin souled. Each Haruno had a second self. Most of them were faintly heard, more like a helpful second opinion and a better memory. Some had well aware 'Alternates' as most called them, and they excelled in anything regarding learning or memory for they truly had two minds to work with. It made the group that chose to be ninja exceptionally precise in their chakra control for they learned it twice as fast. Kizashi and Mebuki were both of the Haruno clan but so far apart in relations it was not looked amiss when they wed as most the Haruno were civilian's. Ruthless and brilliant to a person perhaps but still, civilian's. Even those two had retired from being genin to a life of buying and selling various books and scrolls.

With their Kekkai Genkai it made them ideal people to constantly be filtering in new information among the world and most Haruno members were lovers of the written word. It came with having a little extra help with mental capabilities. Every so often one would be aware enough to be entirely distinct in their Alternate personality. It was the rarest manifestation but also considered one of the most prized to the Haruno. The problem was it had requirements that most would never wish to attempt. You had to be willing to give up control of the body to fully develop them.

There was no guarantee you'd get it back.

()()()()()()

Sakura Fuji Haruno was a quiet and shy child. She was brilliant, as most of them were. Absorbing books as if she ate the words inside instead of her meals. With her very pale pink hair and bright green eyes there was little to describe Sakura that wasn't some form of 'cute'.

Unless you could have seen into her head.

Quiet and patient soft spoken little Sakura had an Inner self, her alternate, that was loud and brash and demanding. They really weren't alike but if not for Inner Sakura, she may have never asked for anything she wanted.

Sakura knew to never speak of her Alternate, to always be aware that this was not herself inside her mind but her twin, her sister, her best friend that would never leave her. It's how they were. Both her parents were very distant cousins and while her mother had a 'sleepy' alternate that mostly seemed to keep tabs on Sakura, her father's was more 'Aware' and sometimes would blurt out really terrible pun jokes.

They had names of course, but it was usually to call Momma and Mommy, or Papa and Daddy. Sakura of course, could tell the difference.

Perhaps nothing would have changed and her Inner would have just stayed the other Sakura and stayed rather half aware and half asleep except that the bullying took a very harsh turn one day.

It was pure chance. They were playing on the equipment at the park and someone thought pushing her off would be funny. The little girl hit the ground and pain took over. Pain that was enough Sakura retreated and didn't want to go back out because the bullying had been getting worse and this was surely just the start. She could see her bones sticking out of her leg and _screamed._

So the other Sakura took over. She wailed and threw a fit to get the other kids in trouble even as she was being fussed over in the Hospital. She basked in Ino's comfort. And Sakura didn't want to go back to being the alternate.

Once Inner Sakura and Outer Sakura decided they could take turns. After all what the first Sakura wanted most was to learn and study and focus on things where the second Sakura wanted to be friends with people and do things and be the center of attention. Calling each other Sakura though was hard, and Inner no longer applied, Alternate wasn't much better.

Quiet Sakura decided since she would use their name less, as the one who didn't feel like being around so many children, she would just get used to being Fuji.

Sakura stopped thinking on it too hard, as she got used to having Fuji there. The switch was seamless when they would employ it, but as the years went on Sakura stayed the dominant personality. Their parents were aware, of course, and knew the name of their daughter since their other child had become the outward one. It wasn't a common occurrence though so they just reminded the girls to switch enough they could both respond to Sakura.

The advantages to being two very developed separate personalities soon manifested as Sakura's grades skyrocketed. She was good at math and theory but Fuji was good at arts and history. Sakura's interest as they studied different specialties and missions and read reports to prepare for their own some day was in genjutsu and medic applications because she liked the idea of fixing what had gotten her out as the dominant personality in the first place. Fuji liked the idea of ninjutsu and long range attacks keep people at bay and they couldn't hurt you. Sakura had good aim but Fuji was the one who was good at katas and seemed eerily good at her precision. They learned that as often happened in the Haruno family, each not only had a different personality and traits but chakra. It was nearly identical, so close you needed to know it could be different to see the ever so slight fluctuations.

They also didn't have to both sleep at the same time even if the body did. So one of the girls would review information or work on ideas why the other slept. It allowed them to always have one of them able to wake them up swiftly even if just because they needed the bathroom.

Outside the household? No one knew.

()()()()()

"Darling, can you please go get some more umeboshi from the market?" Her mother called as she handed out a coin purse. She smiled then, as she noticed the ever so brief purple sheen overlaying the green in her daughter's eyes giving her away. "Thank you Fuji."

Fuji beamed up at their mother and nodded, though she wasn't wanting to set down the book she'd been reading it wasn't too terrible to go to the marketplace. "May I stop at the bookstore?"

Their mother crossed her arms and thought, not that you could hear inside anothers head but a Haruno could always tell when another Haruno was conversing with their alternate. "Oh very well but you stay 'out' the entire time."

Fuji just sighed as she agreed, pink hair fluttering around them. "Yes mother."

"You know I just want you to keep your hold on being Sakura too.." her mother said softly and Fuji smiled. Because she did know that, but it would have been so much easier if the rest of the world could just know there were two people in there!

'Pfft like that wouldn't cause trouble. Even Ino-pig would call us crazy, Cha!' Sakura grumbled and Fuji just smiled as she slipped her shoes on. They were in the second year of the academy and sometimes slipped up as to whom was in charge of the body which would send a lot of their scores all over the place. The _only_ sign if you didn't know their personalities was that when Fuji was in control the eyes had a purple sheen and when it was Sakura it was a brighter jade. Something to do with their chakra differences their father had said and promised to find a book to explain more.

'Like last time when you took over to yell at her and messed up the bulls eye streak I had going?'

'Not my fault I can't throw a kunai without messing up my hair! What if Sasuke-kun noticed me and I was messy?!'

'I think boys don't focus on that.' Fuji replied inwardly as she moved through the streets. It was entertaining though how boy crazy Sakura was. They were only eight!

'Just imagine, some day we'll be fighting and some terrible attack will go in our way and Sasuke-kun will sweep in and rescue me because of course I'll be the one in control and he'll smile and Kyaaaa!'

Fuji fought off a laugh and smiled outwardly, she could just imagine little hearts falling around Sakura like a genjutsu. 'I'd rather be able to get myself out of trouble instead of be the damsel in distress.'

'I want to be treated like a princess!'

'We have to agree.' Fuji reprimanded her gently but Sakura just huffed. It was true though, and since Sakura didn't want to work on those skills it fell to Fuji to do so. Her thoughts went silent as she picked out the umeboshi, one of her favorites and Sakura's too it seemed at least when it came to taste the body itself determined that not which of them was in control. Sakura didn't even pipe up as they entered the bookstore save to ask for a few new math workbooks. It wasn't something Fuji minded, of the two of them logical thinking was Sakura's forte. Though actual application of logic was all Fuji.

"Oh hey Billboard Brow" came a shriek and while muttered remarks on how awful Ino's hair and outfit were came from the current passenger personality outwardly no one knew.

()()()()()()

Sakura turned with a small smile, but one more genuine than if she used the larger one to Ino. "Miss me?"

"Of course _someone_ has to be around to show off how much better looking I am!" Ino watched her subtly, her daddy was teaching her to observe body language and depending on the day and mood Sakura would either be loud as she was or a bit more mellow. Apparently it was a mellow day as Sakura just rolled her green eyes and chuckled, her pink hair moving with the turn as she reached out to show the bags in her hand.

"I have to finish running these home to mother. Do you want to go to the park after?"

"Oh I was just going to tell you I saw Sasuke-kun and he made eye contact with me! Kyaaaa!"

Sakura made a face but Ino was too lost in her own ramblings to think it could be anything but envy.

'Let me out! I'll show Ino-pig!' Sakura was shrieking inwardly and Fuji closed her eyes. Still in control of their body.

'Later. If we go home to mother we've been out and I an give up control. She's so _loud_..'

"Hey!" Ino waved her hand then and Sakura's head canted to the side. "Lets go see if we can find him at the park! Together!"

'Isn't that what you suggested, Fuji?'

'Yes.'

'Wow. Pig's dumber than I thoguht.' and of course Sakura could say that because right now no one would hear her.

"I need to bring mom the groceries and drop off my books but sure Ino!" Sakura's smile was large but not genuine this time. Still, the blonde did not notice as she all but dragged the pinkette home and Fuji was looking forward to being let slide so she could just zone out internally.

"Oh! Thank you darling, hello Ino." Mebuki said with a sweet smile, Ino of course ranting about the plans and so the older pinkette knelt down. "Of course _you_ can go play..Sakura." she said with a tiny smile.

Fuji felt her shoulders drop. It looked like she was going Sasuke hunting. Yay.

()()()()()()()()

'You know..you _could_ let me take over anyways?'

Fuji smiled and mostly zoned out as Ino talked, Sakura would prompt her if it was anything really important. 'No, she's right. I don't interact much. I just wish there were some quieter friends you had.'

'Pfft like who? The Nara kid? He just sleeps all day. See I do not get why you don't just adore Sasuke-kun, he's quiet! And handsome..and strong..and talented..'

'He doesn't seem to like anyone.'

'Well duh I'm going to change all of that!'

Delusional. Her alternate was assuredly delusional.

"Where do you think Sasuke-kun is this time, Sakura?" Ino asked tossing her long hair in a way that almost worked..half still just fell right down instead of swishing as the blonde wanted.

"Maybe practicing at the academy?"

"It's after hours, why would he do that billboard brow?"

'Because he's a perfectionist?' Fuji inwardly grumbled to Sakura who actually laughed at that one.

'Tell her because he's Sasuke-kun.'

'That's not a reason.'

'Trust me.' And if you couldn't trust the other soul in your own body you were doomed so Fuji shrugged and voiced it.

"You're right Sakura! Let's go see!"

'That actually worked. Sakura, your friend is a moron.'

'She's a loyal moron and at least Ino-pig understands when a guy is handsome.'

Sasuke was not there. That didn't mean Ino didn't decide they had to not search the school. Just in case.

()()()()()

Fuji suffered through the visit with Ino but managed to play content until the blonde decided to go look for him somewhere else ditching her, and afterwards Sakura didn't complain when she then took their body to do laps around the academy yard. It was the only measured area she knew well enough to use. Little by little -and without any help from Sakura- she was working on building up their skills and strength. It didn't mean they knew how to use them without being the one who practiced but when you could change who was in control it didn't seem to matter as much.

That was actually one thing they _did_ practice all the time. How fast could they switch. They would do it during tests and only now when no one might see them (sasuke) would Sakura emerge to practice throwing and katas so she and Fuji could work on transitioning mid attack and defense.

If you were to look from the outside it would appear they were terrible. If you actually knew each falter and mistake was because of a constant trading of who held control, even down to the swapping of whose chakra the body was drawing on? It was an amazing accomplishment.

"Wish we got results faster.." Sakura groaned as she missed the target again. She was better at the setup, but she couldn't seem to take over mid attack or defense without skewing everything.

"You'll get better." Fuji encouraged as she took a step back, whirling three kunai into the target. "It'll work in time."

"I want it now." Sakura grimaced as she took over after the next step forward, stumbling a little too far. If they weren't switching Sakura was pretty good.

"Focus on what we've already got figured out..Ngh.." Fuji grimaced as she swapped to shuriken but had to overcorrect Sakura's mistep from her previous follow through.

'Yeah like that you're definitely taking over if we need to strike or dodge?' Sakura sassed amused but kept up with it. It was the only way to get better.

'Hey you're the one that can do math longer than our hair in minutes.'

"Yes fear me evil shinobi, I can do trigonometry. That's not exactly my most attractive feature.."

'I'm here too, I think I know what looks good on us. It isn't red. Besides..' Fuji chuckled as Sakura wouldn't talk to take over when she was practicing a sprint and throw, Sakura _hated_ running. "Sasuke-kun is from a clan right? Maybe making his wife do paperwork is something he'd be interested in." She had no interest in the broody boy but it did make Sakura pause. Good. Getting her to think was always a plus.

"I think we're good..let me just gather.."

"Who are you talking to?" Sakura/Fuji turned and blinked as their eyes met blue.

It wasn't Ino.


	15. Nohara Rei first born but second place

AN: Sorry can't stop the weird ideas. In _Who up there hates me?_ I have a case of a twin who can't use chakra and doesn't hold it against the one who can. They're wonderful and Lee is a very special person. But what if you _weren't_? Especially if you were the twin sister to the beautiful, talented, and sweet Rin and you were none of those things? **Warning this is NOT a nice story. Drama and angst.**

Not every path is a good one, and not everyone's a good person. Some are just in the middle and it doesn't take a lot to push them away.

()()()()()()()

Nohara Rei was born first. It was about the only thing she came ahead of Rin for. Her hair was a muddied color instead of Rin's chocolate, where Rin had lovely dark green eyes like the hidden side of a leaf Rei's were just black. Rin's markings were more vibrant, Rei's were muted and thinner. Rin was sweet and kind and forgiving.

Rei had a temper, knew she was a jealous brat, and while she could do nice things she didn't come by them as effortlessly. She didn't trust easily.

The first thing she learned, though their parents loved them both and didn't try to show it..was that Rin was the better daughter. She may have been born second, but she was everyone's favorite.

When they were children of course they played with all the other children in the village. Where they would pick Rin though and the girls would be happy at her side making flower crowns, Rei would prefer to play active rough games with the boys who soon decided girls were gross. It meant the same children that just hours before she was wrestling with or kicking a ball around were now taunting her and telling her to go away. Don't forget the stupid names they were uttering in her direction.

She hit one of them for teasing her and made him cry. Rin was the one who comforted the same child and told on her to their parents because it wasn't nice.

"Why did you do that?" Their father asked, looming over Rei later on. Rei scowled down at the ground because really wasn't it all nicely laid out when Rin told their parents earlier? If this was to try and make her feel guilty it wasn't going to work. She was far too stubborn.

"He insulted me."

"You cannot go hitting clan kid's, Rei."

That was the second thing she learned. Everyone sided with the clans. The cousin to the brat who had called her such pathetic names started to play with Rin. Uchiha Obito. He was funny, awkward, and nice in a completely messed up way that amused Rei but he'd only play with her if Rin wasn't there. Rei didn't want to be second in yet another thing so she started to avoid Obito even if he could make her laugh.

Things almost got better. Like most of the available kids in the midst of war Rei went to the academy, had watched as Rin seemed to get everyone there to talk to her even the stuck up prodigy Kakashi. Because of the accelerated curriculum it only took a single year before things took another turn for the worse.

Rei had liked the idea of becoming a shinobi and making a name for herself. Who didn't like the idea of being a ninja in a ninja village after all? So she'd studied hard and spent hours until her fingers bled throwing the shuriken and kunai and she worked her taijutsu mercilessly..

Until the chakra lessons started.

She couldn't do a _thing._ She didn't even have enough chakra to eventually learn to tree walk which was considered a necessity. Even Gai who was such a dork the whole class was entertained by him would some day be able to do that.

They were in war times. There was no cease fire coddling and no resources to waste on a dead end. She had a meeting with her parents and sensei and was told not to come back the next day.

"I'm afraid young Rei simply has no more chakra available to her than a regular civilian child. While it's true you can grow chakra through meditation and exercise and other methods there is still a set finite amount that everyone can reach that is determined by each person's system. Rei will never have enough to be a genin."

The words haunted her. Perhaps in the future, in a place that was not so tense with war for all it was unofficial war, she would have made it anyways. With a longer time before needing every able body to set out someone would have been able to work with her and her lack of chakra but where she would never have enough to take to the trees or walk on the rooftops? It was doubtful.

Rei heard her parents talking in whispers one day behind a closed door when she went to get a different book while Rin was at the academy. "Even those with damaged coils can at least tree walk..."

She was worse off than someone 'damaged.' huh?

()()()()()()

Of course, it turned out Rin was a natural. Not only was she good enough with her control to look into medical jutsu's at seven years old but she was possessing such a strong will she could break most genjutsu's some day.

Rei didn't _want_ to dislike her sister..but it was very hard when envy ate her from the inside.

So she avoided her. Rin bought every pathetic lie she gave as a reason they weren't hanging out anymore. Great. She was a better liar than her sister. It didn't make her feel better.

Just a lot worse.

The third thing she realized was Rin deserved a better sister.

()()()()()()

With the path of ninja barred to her Rei was trying to find something else. She still loved weapons and fighting with them, dreaming of if she could..if she had..for a very short time she thought of perhaps becoming a fighter anyways and specializing in them because you know, her aim was extremely good.

One day she went by a training field and saw new genin practicing though and at such a _speed.._ and yet their sensei was scolding them for being slow. That they had not gotten any faster since they graduated. It was enough for Rei to approach their father and ask about it.

"Well of course, the ninja start to enhance everything with chakra. It's how they get as strong and fast as they do. Why do you care, Rei? Asking for Rin?"

Somehow the way he worded it made Rei decide that was closed to her too. But then she was cleaning up Rin's side of their room one day, restless for a lack of direction, and spotted her medical journal open to a page.

'On poison's and drugs used in assassinations'

Oh?

()()()()()()()

There was something here. Rei had rushed to the library, forgotten to eat, barely slept and kept going back. Book after book, every scroll she could find she absolutely _devoured._ This was a skill that if you were not looking to actually heal or save? It didn't rely on chakra. Rei's eyes narrowed and turned thoughtful. She needed good information. The question was who to ask it of because the wrong person would not help her.

Rei wasn't a fool. She'd go to the other most commonly overlooked source of information besides children.

Elders.

()()()()()()

There was a section of Konoha's hospital reserved for those who needed to be close by in case something failed. Of them, she was looking for one in particular. They called him Oni. He was one of the first prisoners kept alive in Konoha, now a ratty old man who spent half his days in the hospital and the other half in his run down home near the hospital. Just in case. He had lost all his hair, most his teeth. He was covered in old injuries and scars with many of his fingers missing and his ankle was broken and never set right so he needed a cane. He had lived through the days of the founding, part of a clan that had attacked not long after Hashirama had been named Hokage. The man knew so much of their enemies however, that the Honorable Wife Mito had made intricate seals that permanently sealed off the mans chakra. Something about a kinjutsu..

The worst of the injuries came from the first time he'd risen up against the village with some of their enemies. He hadn't been properly healed or allowed to leave since. But he was still wise, still knew things for all his ramblings these days were ignored. Visiting a few of the other elders who were bed ridden -and coo'd over by the staff for stopping by to ask them stories- Oni had been brought up again and again.

She lucked out because he seemed more amused at the fact she was seeking out an old poison master who had lost so many fingers just so he wouldn't be able to prepare anything dangerous.

"You want to learn hm?"

"I can't be a ninja by their standards but.."

"You're an evil girl inside aren't you?" He seemed amused though and Rei shifted. She looked at him.

"I'm not evil, but I'm jealous and angry and I want to be _capable._ "

"That I can work with. You ever thought of killing someone or are you just thinking of paralysis?" There was something slimey to his words but Rei steeled herself.

"All Ninja kill eventually." If Rin could face that so could she. "They talk about stealth and being secretive but all the jutsu's I have seen are really loud and obvious.."

Oni's eyes seem to bug out as he gives a gap toothed leer. "Seen through that have you? Well..maybe you've been born too late girl..let's have a nice chat..see if you can appreciate how I knew things." He lets her in.

()()()()()()()

Come into my parlor said the spider to the fly...

I'll make you into something more.

Won't you come sit down and close your eyes?

The bite will only take a moment...

Hollow you out, wrap you up, change your thoughts inside out.

Set you off after those out of my reach.

A fly no more.

Sting, little wasp.

()()()()()()

Rei's days change. She manages to smile at Rin and her parents, feels more in control. She still visits the elderly in the hospital but the rest of the time she's with Old man Oni.

"When I was young, lots of us were not from clans. Plenty didn't have jutsu's to toss about or lots of chakra. Yet we still wiped them out. They'd think it was a plague, or each other.." He'd give that unhinged leer at her and wave around mangled hands. "Nin today, so soon after Konoha has been founded have already forgotten that it's the subtle ways no one tracks. They simper out 'look underneath the underneath' and the tree hugging simpletons forget that no one should know you're attacking! Listen well girl..if you go screaming out your attacks you've already lost. If you have to rely on hand signs, you're too slow. Pfft not a one of these legendary sannin I've heard of probably ever had to battle a samurai. They make an _art_ of striking before a nin can make hand signs."

"Don't they help mold chakra?" She asks, not that it applies to her but he's teaching her in general. Theories that she would never hear elsewhere. One of those crazed eyes locks onto her and he smirks.

"If you need assistance to pull off an attack, little wasp, you aren't capable of using it. It's like using blunted kunai because no one showed you where to grasp it and you don't wish to cut yourself."

"They teach us a well placed attack.."

"What these brats think of as an attack we would have called other names, none of them good to repeat in front of little girls no matter how twisted they think they can be." Oni shakes his head. "An attack is one they never saw coming. A feint so they don't realize what you were up to. If you are fighting them off in defense is the only time you don't dictate how the battle starts but you need to always know how to end it."

"What about how fast they go with chakra?"

Oni grins and it's a dark cruel expression. "The thing about chakra, is the higher up a shinobi is the more they rely on it. You'd be amazed how many I killed without ever using chakra. It used to be a very rare thing in the tales I was taught by my father and his grandfather hadn't even a lick of it but his kill count was legendary, it's only recently become so wide spread but when that happens? Those who know how to work around it can do far more damage without ever being known. Throw a few fireballs and everyone can find you."

There's multiple parts along her body suddenly feeling off and she looks down, eyes wide as there are at least six senbon sticking out of her skin, barely having penetrated. They don't hurt but it feels decidedly weird.

"Just one of those, if I had the right substances on would need to hit. I could scratch you with something in passing. Those without chakra are assassins whom are never sensed little wasp..now pull those out and come here."

()()()()()

Oni is insane.

There's no doubting this, he's half in delusions that he is still at war with many of the clans in the surrounding area where most the names he speaks of have long died out. The man is a terrifying genius when it comes to plants and poisons and ways to kill. He makes her study as he lectures on torture methods and they cause her to squirm but she does not object.

He never poisons her outwardly, but he introduces her to small common ones and taking tiny parts at a time to start building her immunity. It's her mind that he's working the most on and as he watches the dark eyed girl slowly grinding up a mixture that she's going to be testing on herself later he's pleased. Some rush to the prodigies and coo over them. Some look for the genius's. Oni's clan was not made up of families but of the desperate and the angry. The damaged. It can just be a tiny crack but slowly he will wedge it wider and wider until she's been hollowed out and remade.

Danzo had spent years interrogating Oni for methods for Root. He never liked the pathetic mindless creations Root turned out though because you need someone almost broken but not entirely to have creative genius. He'd given up on finding an apprentice, and then the little wasp flew his way. She thought she was just a bee. A single sting and then gone, but he knows something that can sting over and over and bite when he sees it.

One who hasn't the chakra to even be a suspect and so the idiotic fools running this village that has been his prison do not think him a danger now since his chakra is long sealed away. But the true danger of his clan had been in a kinjutsu technique that this little girl is perfect for. He can make her addicted. In her his legacy will go on and that it's a konoha brat who sought him out is so perfect he laughs all the time.

The slide of this girl into not trusting those around her will not take long. They've already been doing much of the work for him and it is a delightful irony that it is the love of a sister she does not want to hate, that is pushing her where he would otherwise need to guide.

()()()()()()()

"Rei?"

"Hey Rin, what is it?" She asks as she waves, leaving from gathering simple plants in the park. None of them are dangerous but she has to learn basic herbology along with the more lethal uses.

"Ah Obito and I are going for dango with some of the other kids, come with us?" And Rin smiles at her, eyes hopeful. She's so adorable when she does that, her whole heart in her eyes. Rei doesn't have the heart to refuse. For all that she feels out of place among the other academy kids all jabbering on about their last lesson and skills she just can't put Rin off that time.

"Oh! Rei I haven't seen you in forever!" Obito laughs as he walks over, grinning under his goggles. "Why haven't I seen you at the academy?"

It makes Rei feel small but Rin is off placing their order along with some of the other kids, and it is just her and Obito right now in the booth. She feels her face grow hot but sighs. "They kicked me out, Obito. I don't have enough chakra."

"What!? That's not cool! Not at all! I'm so sorry Rei I bet you'd have been awesome!" and for just a moment as Obito is ranting and waving his arms, Rei manages a tiny smile.

"Thanks."

"Huh?"

"You're...the first who said so."

"I'm sure Rin said something she's wonderful like that!"

Rei just smiles crookedly at him but it doesn't reach her eyes because of course Rin did. She feels her hand drop to her pocket where a spare key now is to Old man Oni's house so she can let herself in to study on her own if he's hospital ridden.

Because at least there, she's 'little wasp' instead of Rin's sister. Self disgust at her thoughts hollows her out a little more.

()()()()()()

The time flies by and soon Rin has graduated, she's placed on a team with Obito and Kakashi because of _course she is._ The boy she loves and the one who loves her. Why Rin can't see it Rei doesn't know but it is just one more difference in them.

Rei doesn't have anyone who even thinks of her like that, not when her face isn't as soft and her jaw is too strong, her grandmother once called it..

"You've got the Nohara face, girl. It makes for handsome features. Rin takes after your mother, those Oiwa always did look far too pretty the lot of them." Their grandmother was the absolute definition of a handsome woman. Not beautiful but handsome. Strong features that were even as opposed to delicate, proud of bearing. It was not a bad thing..

When you were older.

The number of awkward hopeful boys who have approached her to see if Rin may be open to their confessions is frankly weird and she's taken to (when applicable) staring at the strangers. "Do I _know you?"_ It works rather well.

The rest of the time she's learning with Oni, poisons and methods and antidotes. He's worked with her in an empty room of his house to show her how to throw and there's a boy one day who takes her out and starts showing her what to do at the training grounds but says as little as possible. Oni never tells her anything, just that he'd given a few more ideas in exchange and shut up and take the help already girl.

()()()()(()

"Rin!" A hand claps down on her shoulder and she's whirled around to face Obito's beaming grin, a silver haired boy and a yellow haired older man behind them. "There you..Whoops! Sorry Rei!"

"Oh? Hello there.." The cheery looking older man beams down at her but it's a smile that sets Rei on edge because it's that softness over steel Oni has taught her to look out for. Those who smile so honestly but they wear danger like a pair of comfortable shoes. "You do look like little Rin. You know her Obito?"

"Oh yeah, Rei this is Minato-sensei and that's Bakakashi..he's stupid."

There's a moment of silence before Rei realizes that's literally the end of Obito's introduction and shakes her head but a smile has stolen across her lips because Obito is amusing. She'd forgotten...

"Nohara Rei, Rin's twin. Nice to meet you."

"Are you a ninja too?" Minato asks cheerfully and she can hear Obito gulp next to her, even as the silver haired boy, really this is whom Rin is so in love with? With the drooping eyes and entirely not interested demeanor? Well he is clearly dismissing her.

"No, I was disqualified because my chakra levels will never permit me to be a genin." Rei says evenly and she's buried the pain and the anger so deep they don't choke her anymore but they are festering and she knows it as surely as she takes a little venom or poison each time she visits Oni only this one is emotional.

The silver haired boy snorts and Minato seems taken aback. Perhaps if things were different she'd be drawn into a talk, she'd get to know her sister's team. But there's no point to it because they are in a world she is not so she just turns to Obito and manages a weak smile. Because he tried, and it's always nice that Obito tries to involve everyone. "Rin said she was going by the hospital first. You may be able to catch her."

"Okay! Thanks Rei!" Obito grins at her again and the three are off as if never there.

Her blood is rushing in her ears at how easily Obito left without even a goodbye at the thought of getting to see Rin..

It sounds like wasps buzzing these days.


	16. Nohara Rei first born but second place 2

AN: Part two of Nohara Rei

()()()()()()

Rei ends up spending time with her sister and only her sister one lazy summer afternoon. The girls have their feet in a stream and are just talking about so much of nothing. It was heart soothingly peaceful leaving Rei to understand she had forgotten how much she loves doing this with Rin.

"So then Obito goes and falls _off_ the branch.."

Rei doesn't mind hearing about their exploits. Not when it is just them because Rin doesn't react as Rei would, and so it's hard to be upset. Oh she's still jealous her sister is a ninja, but it's been almost a year now. A year and Rei has a grace to her as she moves now that Rin does not, Rei's eyes flicker about as a habit. She's making progress with Oni's studies, the strange quiet boys who come and get her to work with her in the middle of the night without her parents or twin even knowing; who barely talk and never show emotion. She has never once asked about them since Oni told her over a year ago he'd called in a favor for her and so she takes the hint to never bring anything up.

So when Rin chatters on and it sounds more like a bunch of friends having playground adventures, it's hard for Rei to be as jealous as she was once upon a time. Hard, but not impossible.

"You're so quiet.." Rin says and Rei looks over, smiles.

"I like listening to my nee-chan." And she does. She can smooth over the envy and the self doubt for a time to pretend, here in the sunlight.

So Rin tells her more about the boys. She talks with soft blushes and sighs about Kakashi and it makes Rei chuckle.

"What! He's..he's.."

"I'd prefer someone who wanted to be with me." Rei says and she shrugs a shoulder. "Over someone impressive..but it is not my crush we are talking about." She means it though, she's been overlooked and pushed aside as so many are who cannot be ninja. Unlike them though, she _wanted_ and so there's a deep ache that will never leave her. Perhaps it is petty of her but she also cannot picture herself with any of the good 'civilian' boys. Not when Oni's words whisper in the back of her mind and she seeks exits and shadowy spots to observe. Where how they stand and speak are clear signs to her. When that dark slightly less than sane laugh of his permeates her thoughts and she wonders if they would even be _aware_ should she walk by and all it would take is a scratch, a tiny bite from a needle..nothing they would notice until she was long gone.

"Do you like anyone, Nee-chan?" Rin asks and her eyes are so soft and hopeful that Rei sighs and thinks of the most likely boy she could even consider in such a way as to indulge her sister's momentary silliness..and the irony sits thick upon her tongue.

"No, but I do like how Obito makes me laugh." She does, she always has but he cannot be swayed. Rei's affection is that of a once friend anyways, someone he rarely sees and while she likes his company she can safely say she has never been around the boy to decide if it could be anything more in time. Not that he'd ever switch his gaze from her sister.

"That'd be perfect!" Rin clasps her hands together with a laugh. "It really would! Oh, if I could have Obito as a brother and you with Kakashi as one..wouldn't it be perfect?!" And Rei hasn't seen Rin laugh like this in so many years..not since she was kicked out of the academy and her bitterness began to poison her time with her sister so Rei simply yields.

"Yeah." Because what harm can it do?

()()()()()

"Your sister putting fool ideas in your head, little wasp." Oni mutters when she comes in the next day and she doesn't even think for a moment on how he knows, because she has learned a long time ago for an old man with no chakra, he has ears and eyes and fingers..everywhere.

"It did no harm to play along."

"Oh...?" And there's that heavy drawl to his voice and he will say nothing, teach nothing, until she explains so Rei sits down and gives in. She has learned not to resist when she is here, Oni is the master and she yields.

"Her romantic ideas cannot pan out. One does not realize or return the affection, the other would not turn theirs from her to me. You did ask me to act as much as a normal girl so I did not draw suspicion with my visits." And he had, she looks up and his bulging eyes twitch but the gap tooth leer is there.

"Good..good..just remember girl..you have no room to actually feel for those things. Play with them, fake the emotions, but never let them dig in. They'll distract you and when you get distracted.." his cane slams down, crushing a fly that had just gone by. "You've got no chakra of your own and never will, little wasp. You will _always_ be one strike from death. Don't let them get close enough to give it."

"Hai, Oni-seishou." And as she closes her eyes it is not so hard to leave the dreams where they were with Rin, because everyone their age with the war is going to be ninja or avoiding anything else to work..so it is not as though Rei knows anyone anyways..

"Now then..where would you be hiding, how would you strike..if I gave you ..." and he goes to pull down one of his old weapons, he sets it down and the quizzes begin.

()()()()()()

"Rei-chan won't you come see us off? It's going to be a big mission tomorrow.." Rin is saying as chipper as ever, she's flittering about because of something, Rei's not really paying attention as she chuckles and at some point Obito has come by and yet..Rin escapes into the market stalls after some trinket that's caught her eye.

"She's really worked up.." She says softly and Obito sighs.

"Bakakashi got a promotion.." He is sulking and Rei looks over at him amused. Perhaps because he seems so upset his rival is ahead, where Rei is so far behind..

"Well in time I bet you'll beat him out." Obito is giving her a strange look and Rei shrugs. They're about to go on a mission..she can cheer him up since her sister is off being so oblivious. "I'll never have the chance to go as far as you and Rin can Obito..so go twice as far for me too."

"You really wanted to be a ninja, Rei? I mean..you never seemed.." He shifts and she sighs but smiles. Because Obito is there and she's missed company that wasn't serious and drilling her on things she's not entirely comfortable with. It's hard not to like Obito, he's too kind.

"I practiced until my fingers bled, I ran until I gasped for air..I don't do things small, Obito." She confesses and when she looks up, his goggles are doing little to obscure his serious look. It's the first time Rei feels like someone is really seeing her and so she gives a tiny smile. "I thought maybe I still could..even when I heard about the lack of my chakra but then I saw some genin one day and how they sped up..I can't be a ninja, I can't be one who protects.." in the back of her mind the buzzing calls out and hisses almost because she isn't learning to protect. She's learning how to infiltrate and kill, to interrogate and silently remove. It's so different than what she wanted to do some day but it is the only option to be _more_ that has come to her and so she takes it, ignoring the mud that she is going to be wading through. How her dreams have been scattered and leaving only torn memories behind.

"I wanted it so badly Obito...but you know, maybe it's just meant for those with talent."

"What's that make me then?" He says with a pout and Rei laughs, feels it to the bottom of her lungs as she hasn't in a long time and smiles. "Dork. You have talent. Just different kinds than 'Bakakashi.'"

And she means it, but for Obito's pride she pretends to not see him wiping his eyes.

"I think you'd really have been a good kunoichi.." Obito says and Rei chuckles, seeing their sensei and other teammate come she pats his shoulder, knowing Rin is going to be too distracted so she'll tell her goodbye in the morning. But she really doesn't want to stand around as the two pale haired boys on her sister's team shuffle as they cannot talk to her, because she's just..not. Which is good because if anyone knew what she was learning...Oni-seishou had been very clear about the fact that would likely be her end. Not that Rei sees the separation tactic for what it is. So instead she gives a last heartfelt smile to Obito, ignoring the rest of his team coming up.

"And I _know_ you already are a fine ninja, Obito."

If she'd known those would be the last words she'd say to the boy alive..she wouldn't have changed a thing.

()()()()()()()()

The news of his death is hard. She doesn't take his eye being worn by Bakakashi well and is ever so grateful he hides it yet, it stings and all the more because it is hidden. It isn't fair..but she cannot say that because Rin is falling apart and most nights Rei climbs into Rin's bed to hold her sister while she cries.

"Why'd it have to be Obito.." Rin whimpers and Rei's throat is tight as her eyes fill with tears, but Oni's teachings have already gone deep and with the loss of such a bright person, a better one than Rei for certain, it seems she's a little more hollowed.

She goes to Oni and sighs. "I'm ready to learn to distance myself.." She says softly and she doesn't miss the unholy pleasure her words bring him.

"You lost someone.."

"I lost a friend."

"Good...that will make this easier." And it is sick and twisted but the ache of knowing one of the few people who she had to talk to is gone, it's selfish but she knows it.

"I'm..not a nice person.." She mumbles and Oni laughs as she comes to that confession as she's slicing herbs for a new poison he walked her through. One she'd be trying on herself like so many others. Little by little she's getting familiar with mild poisoning symptoms and learning to work through pain and discomfort. Some days she can take the stronger ones but they cannot do it too often for it would seem strange if she were to be sick all the time even if her low chakra means getting sick more often _is_ likely. No one knows she's visiting Oni or why, after all. Rei still visits other elders, learning what she can just from their stories.

Oni has taught her though that without actual chakra beyond that which all things possess, she's invisible. Why would anyone care what a slip of a girl is up to? Because Rin is viewed as an adult with the headband she wears but it will take Rei another six years or so before she has the same consideration.

"No you aren't, little wasp. Those who are come rarely but most of us are just dying embers. The good ones? You'll come to see them and their blinding light and you know what will happen little wasp? You'll want to snuff them out. Not because of anything more than the good ones will otherwise tarnish. Watch them crumble and dim and sometimes they explode into a raging fire and other times they suck out the light of others as they falter and then go out. You snuff them out when they're still vibrant and they don't have that happen."

His words twist her innards cruelly but for the first time it does as Oni wants, he watches the girls black eyes dim and her shiver at the idea. He sees her picture the friend she lost turning into one of the many hollow eyed ninja about Konoha, imagine it happen to the glorious light of her sister...

She unconsciously takes a step away from the light and further into the shadows as the realization hits her. Because for those of them that are dwellers of the shade the bright light is a beacon, but it blazes forth to expose their faults. The longer she's in the muck and mire that accumulates in the shadows the less she'll tolerate the light.

Oni smirks. He knows. In time her sister will burn her and the scars from that will be exactly what he needs to finally give the little wasp her stinger. She's nothing else to give herself to so she's crammed years of study and practice into this short year and a half he's had her. The girl oozes talent, genius driven by insatiable drive instead of innate. He finds himself wondering how long it will be before the purity of her sister is either snuffed out or roaring into destruction.

Hopefully soon. He'd like to ensure there is nothing to lure his little wasp back to Konoha when he's sealed her path to leave it. He doesn't have that much longer before he'll need to force his hand after all.


	17. I woke up as Ten-Ten

One day I woke up as Ten-Ten.

There was no knowledge of how or why. Indeed I did not remember anything before except that apparently I had not been Ten-Ten when I went to sleep and the memories Ten-Ten had were fuzzy but present, they felt though more like when you first awaken from a dream and that other reality was sharper and brighter than the one you found yourself sitting up in.

Only, reversed.

Of the fact I had not been Ten-Ten when I went to sleep I was certain, but how or why this was I could not say. Nor did I know whom I could possibly have been other than she, because there was no other thoughts. No reason to suspect I was other except I just..knew it.

I was small. I knew I was only eight years old but I felt like I was too young, that I shouldn't have been.

"You feeling all right little one?" I looked up and saw my father Tenchi, and just nodded. No in truth I was not all right but I didn't know how to explain to my father that I was no longer his daughter I just had the body and memories. My skin prickled, it felt too tight and my blood rushed too strongly. He sighed and then touched my forehead.

"You don't feel hot..I suppose you should take it easy though today, okay? No overdoing it at the academy."

I'm...really not sure how I even made it there. My memories are slightly askew, like I put a shirt on as pants. They still cover what needs to be but it doesn't fit right and certainly feels off. Luckily or perhaps unluckily? I have always been focused more on my studies so most won't be able to catch such a difference in my mannerisms. I do not know why I have acted as my thoughts insist I have in the past but I will let it go now.

Until I wake up.

()()()()()()()

I never 'woke up' properly. Every night I go to sleep, and every morning I am half curious and half resigned to the fact I am still named Ten-Ten. One of the only things that makes sense to me is the feel of the weapons in my hands. This my muscles know, my mind does not argue with as there is less thinking and more instinct. Only in my weapons work does the dichotomy soothe and lessen. So I practice, and practice more. It becomes my outlet for all of the emotions and there are many I am plagued with. Too many sometimes, I feel too strongly, too deeply. I avoid the kids my age because it just feels off. They're playing ninja, playing something that is so wrong and so serious and I channel my fear and determination into my weapons yet more. They will not teach us advanced taijutsu or ninjutsu yet so I refuse to wait.

Perhaps our chakra needs to grow, perhaps our bodies as well but we can adjust. We can _learn._ The few pitiful exercises for chakra we have I practice relentlessly because as small as the trickles are they drop by drop will expand my reserves and biologically the odds are against me when it comes to my chakra storage.

I am the only nine year old I know with full callouses from seven weapons on my hands and fingers and I relish in each one.

At nine is also when I am told more stories of our previous homeland, the rules and traditions, the ancestral spirits and that apparently it is this which has forged my connection to weapons. It is a sort of secret bloodline trait, but here in the land of ninja such things are too well known and my father says we always kept ours a secret. He has managed to recreate in small, in a room that should have been a larger closet, a shrine to our ancestors. The few things he took with him when he fled are there. More prized than blood.

I am taught the words, the prayers and the stories.

For some reason, I find spending an hour or two at a time in the dark with only a tiny candle as I pray and meditate around the ancestral altar soothing. If I go there, father leaves me be. He says it is my birthright and gives a funny smile before leaving.

Two months after my birthday I learn why.

Really, I woke up feeling as if I was someone else in this body and so seeing ghosts shouldn't surprise me.

Of course though it did. So much so that my throat closed up and I couldn't get out the scream, just a pathetic rasping sound as my throat was too tight with my eyes too wide.

Several forms are just there, intangible, watching.


	18. Silk and Steel 2

AN: Continuing Silk and Steel.

()()()()(()()

The following months became a blur. I went to the academy but now Itachi or Mikoto-sama always were there to pick me up if my father wasn't. My mother rarely left the compound. She created too much of a stir being so close to the fire lord. Minako-hime preferred to keep it under wraps that we were so closely related as we were where the villagers were concerned. As it was I had progressed two years ahead of my classmates and could potentially graduate early. I would be a few years behind the record that Itachi set, but it was not in the art of war and ninja that my strengths lay.

On one day after Fugaku had started using me for a few questions after every training session as his own personal sounding board, it was Itachi who came to pick me up.

Unfortunately it was also the day I was sporting quite the black eye.

"What happened?"

I looked up, my left eye was fairly swollen and inclined my head slightly. I really did not wish to speak of it so close to the hearing of the lingering academy brats who were already whispering loudly about the great Itachi having been there to pick me up. He just hn'd, our trademark acknowledgment of something when we did not feel we should or could spare the words, and began to walk. I followed.

One perk to Itachi being the one to come and get me is he never really needed an explanation. Somehow, perhaps from all the furtive glances and whispers, by the time we reached the Uchiha favored training ground well outside the compound he'd picked up from my class mates and upperclassmen that I had a fight defending my honor as an Uchiha.

I was fully aware that Itachi, early graduate and all..and yes, new member of Anbu potential trainee that he was, was against fighting. He was a pacifist. So was I. It was part of why at his own advice I was getting as good at taking out an opponent quickly as I was, I did not wish to drag out pain or battle.

"Your eyes.." Itachi trailed off. It wasn't a question, indeed that he'd even say as much as a statement said much of how close we had gotten in the time we shared Fugaku's merciless training together. He only spoke so that I could judge the truth of what he said, and follow his thought process more. I think Itachi also liked knowing I always knew when he was telling the truth and that otherwise I would respect his silence. He did the same for me.

"Because they are not dark enough, they cast fault on my known heritage." I agreed silently, content to just sit beside the prodigy of our clan. Well one of them. Pure and highly talented bloodlines may be corrupt without chakra to balance and purify things but amongst highly skilled ninja families it did not. You did not of course, marry first cousins but aside from that we could intermingle as the other high profile clans did. The civilians didn't understand because in their ranks it caused birth defects and other negative reactions. With us however, all it did was become adjusted by the chakra that ran through us thick as syrup on a cold winter's day. This also meant we had a lot of prodigies. I knew if I was included, there were a good half dozen of us. Four were purely shinobi style, such as Itachi and his friend I had heard of but never actually met, Shisui. There were many in the adults too, Fugaku was one. My own father for all he was only possessing the sharingan in one eye was a prodigy with taijutsu and kenjutsu.

I was considered one in many ways though it was sheer determination not natural talent that aided me in my fighting. Fugaku could do wonders when teaching but you had to have drive, not just desire. The difference was marked. You could want to be strong but if you weren't out fighting for it, it did you no good. You couldn't question the one who was training you, for that meant you didn't trust them to know what they were talking about. It was like how I never asked my mother anything but 'why this' instead of just why questions when she was teaching me dyes and paints to use on fabrics. Why did we use some that were plant derived and some that were set with salt on different materials? Why did this ink work better with paper instead of that paper? Those were fine. But the 'why do I have to paint circles for a quarter hour before I begin' usually were not the right sort of question unless approached from a technical perspective.

'What does this serve' was fine. But not a whining why. When I asked the reasoning behind doing circles so long and not say, lines, I was allowed to learn it loosened my wrist for delicate control in application of ink and paint. The same went with fighting when under Fugaku. He was chief of the military police, father, clan head. He had no time for questions. He would tell me to do something and even if it was just to keep me occupied while he showed Itachi something, it would somehow strengthen or aide me even if it was not something I could see at the time. Sometimes it was just to keep it well and surfaced that sometimes I would be told to do something as a ninja beneath me, or so I would feel, and how to cope.

My thoughts were brought to the present when Itachi's hand landed on top of my head, just resting there. He wouldn't ruffle my hair and disturb the careful coif my mother set it in to keep tight at the academy. It was just comforting.

"You're one of the best things to happen to the Uchiha." Itachi finally said quietly and I closed my eyes to savor the moment. I made certain to memorize the scents and sensations around me to immortalize the memory. Something to pull out when I needed a happy time in the future. It was Itachi's way of returning that night when I had pledged my truth to him and Fugaku as long as I lived. Itachi took great care since then to always assure me my regard was returned. He knew I was going to be a kunai with a sharp handle that would cut the user. I had specific uses, and severe downsides.

Telling and sensing the truth in a world of ninja, when it was eventually found out, would isolate and endanger me. Itachi understood that too well.

"I took on five."

"Just the black eye?" Itachi knew of course, but he liked asking questions. He savored the truth as it fell from me every time, no matter how small. I couldn't ever hold back from it knowing how much it was valued, like a dragon with gold and pearls. I also knew he took such great care, as his father did, to keep my secret. Not even my parents knew and when I had confessed that to them that same night, softly and scared, the full extent of my loyalty laid bare, it had only cemented my role in being cherished by the two.

It was really a pity I saw Itachi as my older mentor figure mostly. He was perfect in so many ways, but I did not view him as a partner. Not at my age. Still, he knew even though he did not ask that should he ever actually request I would agree to wed him without blinking. Fugaku knew as well, and it always softened his scowl so sightly. Because I knew Itachi treasured my honesty to him and how unreserved I was. I knew him after all, knew all the things he couldn't say but his silence would scream to my senses by his omissions on things and I never pried.

"I have a few minor scrapes and bruises.." I paused and sighed feeling like the stereotypical nara. "I am certain I shall be promoted to the current class of potential graduates..I will need to work on my studies more to test out."

"If I am free I shall quiz you."

I leaned into Itachi in thanks. I think it was another thing he craved, I never asked or demanded anything he pledged to be fulfilled. I understood his loyalty and his drive, I would never bring up something he could not accomplish. After all, I could not lie.

"So cute!" A laughing voice called out from the tree but though I tensed, Itachi just gave a heavy sigh. One of the few I had ever heard. Trusting him implicitly I kept my eyes closed and body relaxed. I didn't know who this was, but Itachi did and in all ways I placed my safety in his hands without reservation.

It turned out, the voice was the infamous Shisui who proceeded to try and tease Itachi and I mercilessly. I think the fact I barely blushed, and merely stayed contently where I was startled him. I had no reason to blush and stammer about the 'Itachi got a girlfriend' jokes. Really, I was a girl and his friend and if he chose in the future to try and navigate clan politics with a truthsayer as I had started to think of myself then I would take my place as his wife.

If we had been a more jovial group I have little doubt Fugaku and Itachi may have even teased me about my content behavior as the 'secret backup plan' if Itachi did not find a better option to wed in the future. Shisui continued to leer at Itachi, one of the prodigies though I did not remember on precisely what I could tell by the outpouring in his voice and movements that he had a grasp on chakra which would leave even Itachi far behind. Curious.

"Ah well now, aren't you going to introduce me to the little cutie? Hello! I'm Uchiha Shisui!" The way he simply dismissed social propriety was amusing but I kept my mouth from curling into a smile, I did not bother to try and hide it from my eyes though. After all, Itachi trusted him.

"A pleasure, I am Uchiha Doriimu."

"Wait..how come I never saw you if you're one of us?" Shisui was leaning forward, just shy of being invasive to my personal space and though he attempted some measure of tact his 'you're an uchiha bastard or something?' was clear enough though he kept from stating it. My pride caused me to straighten even further, though my fingers stayed lax and open on my lap. My chin tilted up and through half lowered lashes I regarded him with the 'ice woman nobility' stare that my mother had taught me. It was a cold dangerous look, and I had taken to it swiftly. It wouldn't work with the Sharingan but as I did not have it..

"I keep a full schedule, and aside from the Academy or in the company of one trusted to my parents I do not leave the compound." It would sound to someone else, save perhaps a Hyuuga, as if I was sheltered. It was however, the sort of thing heiress's had occur. It was why despite being entirely capable I had an escort when I went to and from the academy. I had been able to go and visit the fire lord several times in my life and it was no secret in his court that he favored 'little daydream' as he liked to call me, as much if not more than my mother. I regularly sent packages with my painting progress and calligraphy alluding to stories of my mother and his childhood that others would not pick up on. It was always best to honor your relatives after all. Especially ones with such high connections.

That I knew he laughed seeing poems describing a pond's light, and a picture of lotus blossoms and koi would only occur to him or my mother about the story she shared when they were little and he fell into the pond trying to catch a bright red koi that he was convinced had to be a dragon in disguise, and gotten tangled in the water plants. I enjoyed my silly packages to my distant relative and often I was sent similar trinkets. Not things of great value- though on my birthday those were certainly present- but a single serving of a tea he liked. Stories of places he had recently been. I was a breath of simplicity in his life as he told me, hence his corruption of my name to little daydream. I was his reminder of the world beyond.

So I certainly was not about to be insulted by my own clan mate.

"Ano.." Shisui blinked, uncertain how to respond and Itachi just made a 'hn' sound. Highly amused. Out in public neither of us would state my connections and so Shisui was left completely unaware of just how he had slighted me, only that he had.

"So how did you get the shiner?"

"I sent five others to their place at my feet for suggesting I was less than Uchiha."

There was a long pause, Shisui looking from me to Itachi, and then he threw his hands up in the air "Okay, I am missing something! Fine! I'm just going to follow you both until I find out what it is!" He crossed his arms then and -pouted- of all things. Turning I lifted a brow to Itachi, uncertain if this was someone actually raised in our clan. Itachi just nodded, humor flickering in his dark eyes and I decided to let it pass.

Shisui though, would not cease following us. It was rather unnerving. When we left the bench and stopped for dango, he trailed after. Talking _at_ Itachi rather than to him at every chance. I was mostly left alone. After a while Itachi softly murmured to me "Just ignore him. It bothers him."

The surprising remark almost made me laugh. Especially as I could feel the whirling eddies of his words against my soul making me highly entertained. My lack of answer was enough to the scarily competent shinobi and we turned ignoring Shisui and his increasingly insane remarks into a game. It lasted until an ANBU dropped by us, holding out a message scroll to Itachi.

"The Hokage demands your presence at once."

Itachi nodded, and opened the scroll, reading it rapidly with his sharingan before using a twist of chakra to incinerate it. There was ever so slightly a moment of hesitation on his part.

"Shisui..."

"Am I needed too?" The ANBU had left of course, simply delivering it's message. Itachi frowned. "Escort Doriimu-chan to my father. Do not tarry, and speak to no one on the way." The voice was steel and lethal, chakra laced. By the way Shisui's demeanor changed I assumed this was the Anbu version of Itachi I was seeing.

I could feel the sensation of my eyes _pushing_ as if demanding I focus. Itachi was the same, just more so. This was the truth of Itachi, he was a pacifist but one that knew he was the best weapon for the job. Perhaps with the potential if no one derailed him to become a legend of his own making. His eyes still red, Itachi's gaze snapped to me. "Stay with my father." The words were heavy and laced to my senses. I _needed to stay_ but not for my own sake. Curious.

Itachi never asked anything of me so of course I merely nodded. There was a slight hesitation as if he was waiting to see what I would say. My head tilted ever so slightly, Shisui was there..did he want?

Yes. Judging from the tension..Itachi did want me to say what ever it was I was feeling. There was no doubt my gaze was reddish at the moment, my mutated sharingan as he'd started to suggest it could be slowly manifesting.

"Question everything." It was all I could say, the only thing that demanded out.

It clearly rocked both shinobi with me to the core. Itachi paused and there was a flicker of his fingers, then he was so close to me I knew from the lack of squawking from Shisui that there was a massive genjutsu hiding the interaction.

"What.."

"Something is false." Was all I could tell him. Itachi's eyes burned into mine but he knew I could and would not lie to him. He nodded and drew a shuddering breath.

"I must go."

"Yes..but .." I worked my jaw, feeling as if I was held under water. I knew something but I couldn't know at the same time and it was maddening. Not when Itachi needed me! Still he waited. Despite or perhaps because of the summons, something that was going on behind the scenes he needed to know and I sighed heavily, looking up at him. Ever so slowly the words came to me and I felt thick tears that burned move down my cheeks, like blood.

"The Hokage office..isn't..secure.." the words slipped out and weren't what I meant to say. I felt myself sway, blood leaving my face. The truth of my words was a terrifying idea, but more so that they had even come out. Potentially treasonous..

Itachi's face went stone.

"Do not leave my father's side until I come back for you." He waited then and eying me he spoke, fingers wiping away the traces of tears from my face, yet still his voice was the harsh edge like the tanto he would wield and cutting into thought and bone alike. It was a voice that _made_ you obey. "I will come back."

"Yes." I answered to both and for just a moment Itachi closed his eyes. He was only twelve. Too young. His soul was ancient however, this was something I felt so deeply in my nature that I couldn't even think to argue it. Itachi was ageless.

"...hn..." It was our Uchiha answer to everything. Only another Uchiha ever seemed to understand.

He wouldn't leave willingly. Duty was calling him but I could tell for some reason he felt the need to stall, to wrap himself in the truth that came with my words. He knew what he was going for and did not want it, did not like it.

I took my necklace, just a simple chain made of black metal that my firelord relative thought was suitable, with a tiny single garnet of astounding clarity and wrapped it around his wrist.

"You aren't alone."

Itachi's eyes locked on me and I was pleased to see his shoulder's ever so slightly ease. Within one second and the next he was gone, and Shisui was acting like he hadn't even been aware of time passing, of being in the genjutsu.

Curious.

What other secrets did Itachi hide..but I did not finish the thought. I did not wish to tempt my gift now that I knew it could answer truths I did not actually have asked of me. Such an open ended question could be disastrous. It wasn't as if I had control. Not that sort.

"So onward to the compound!" Shisui announced and offered his arm. Like a gentleman. As it was impolite to decline, my hand rested on his arm as we walked. Several times he tried to engage me in conversation but I answered none of it. I had the feeling of being watched and I would not rouse anyone's suspicion.

Shisui seemed relieved to hand me off to Fugaku, as much as he could be being forced to interact with our clan head at least. Apparently my silence had bothered him and he was trying to be friendly.

Fugaku wasted no time bustling me into his study and applying a standard privacy seal. The moment it was in place I told him everything. From the academy fight to Itachi's leaving and my sensing of being watched. I left nothing out, it was too important and just because I did not see a significant reason to tell something did not mean he wouldn't.

Fugaku paced and then nodded, sitting at his desk.

"You have questions." Fugaku did not ask, he was fully aware. I nodded but did not voice them. He could tell me anything or nothing as was his right and I would respect that.

Fugaku smiled wanly then. "It's a rare trait for one to trust so fully as to not demand answers." Fugaku's praise was always different, gentle in it's own way.

"Itachi was recently made an offer to become captain as you know, of his own Anbu team once the requisite number of missions are filled. This has put additional strain as the rest of the clan feels we deserve more and are eying for a more..rapid..change. The elders are a problem. It is a constant strife between the suspicion most of Konoha's elders and ninja regard us with since the Kyuubi. We were not all at the front line and they forget so swiftly that our role as the military police is to see to the safety of the civilians who cannot tend to themselves. It is held against us."

I felt a sharp breath of air force it's way into my lungs and diaphragm. The oxygen burned as I realized the immensity of what Fugaku had just revealed to me. If this is the looming katana over the neck no wonder my twisted gift has been such a relief to them.

Fugaku slowly nods. I make myself comfortable and my clan head is kind enough to hand over a scroll for my perusal. This has clearly been waiting for the next time he thought something would occur and I would need to wait with him for an extended period. It is _fascinating_ to me as it details the many historical accounts of our ancestors and ways they all unlocked their sharingan. It takes time to read, as the luxury of being skilled enough to write was not always common back then and some of the words are in need of contemplation to divine what they meant to explain.

The most common is of course, in battle. Anger and fear, desperation. These are _known_ methods. The truth is our veins burn with Ameratsu's black flames, passion that can be deadly and impossible to quench for those things we feel a devotion to. So for us any truly strong emotion will pull out the sharingan if it is going to manifest. My fingers trail along the old scroll, faithfully copied by and at some point many years ago, perhaps shortly after Konoha's founding or before it. The time when the first such scroll was written though? Impossible to learn.

Devotion is there and I half close my eyes, head turned to the side in thought. Devotion is an emotion I feel into my marrow when it comes to Fugaku and Itachi. I have many a time spoken, even just before being brought here. I do not censor my gift though my treasonous words earlier could have seen me exiled for certain. Yet my sharingan has not emerged. There is the chance it never will but I would like it to, our clan uses it for more than just battle. It is a constant camera, locking information into the mind. To memorize precious moments and occasions in a way that will succor the soul into old age. To be able to analyze why I react a specific way with my gift, at a later date?

The door slides open, the privacy seal tears, and Itachi is there. He bows to his father and then sits beside me, not quite across or parallel but holding himself at an angle. "..when I am thirteen.." Itachi rasps out and Fugaku's eyes close as I feel the blood leave my face.

He will be promoted..so young. Oh Itachi is skilled, skilled as one comes perhaps once in an entire lifetime or a handful of them but to lead any group requires experience and that he does not have. It is not right nor fair but that is not my place. There is a tense undulation to the air and red eyes lock onto my own. He's waiting, he has something he needs to say but his jaw is clenched tight as if he's gnawing on the words, knowing whatever will be uttered may well flay me to my marrow. He will not do such a thing willingly and I feel my heart shudder. Of himself Itachi will give everything for Konoha and the Uchiha, but he will not ask this of another.

So I must take the step for him.

"Ask of me." I speak and I do no fear the spiraling red and black of his gaze.

"I need you to graduate immeadiately." He says not why, or what the plan is after and the truth of the matter is that it is all unimportant information. Itachi has yielded what he feels he can and while neither of us forgets the indominatble presecense of Fugaku our eyes only blink to break contact.

"Very well."

Itachi's shoulder's tighten a little more, I hear the shift of his hands clenching fabric. "You will need to be tutored..and after..I have people I need you to meet."

I nod as my answer and there is something to the vermillion gaze that is locked on me, demanding to know what I will not verbalize even as he keeps a library of secrets behind his teeth.

"You cannot breathe a word of this to anyone."

I want to bow my head, to open my mouth and let some impassioned speech come out but there is something to this moment that is defying my ability to form words. There is truth to Itachi's actions right now that batter me with the desperation of crow wings. Itachi has never requested a favor and to do so so fervently, in such a fashion?

All I can do is give him a smile. A promise without words. Slowly, relaxing, Itachi lets the red fade from his gaze.

The tapestry has threads ripped out then in our lives, and something new is about to be woven.

()()()()()()()

My days bleed.

Itachi fills my time relentlessly with his assistance and Fugaku's, but it is mostly Itachi. He is utterly ruthless as a shinobi and this is now unerringly all directed at me. He knew I could graduate, I had the skill but had no desire to be a prodigy of such a level. One afternoon when he pleaded I graduate early though and just learn from him and those he wished me to and all I could sense was the utter truth that he _needed_ this favor and would never ask if he felt he had another way and I had risen up to the challenge.

Black fire pulses through my veins for I am Uchiha and when one to whom I gave my loyalty called I could do no less than burn to answer.

You can demand a graduation exam at any point of the career but it is rarely heeded. I am Uchiha, I am related to the fire daimyo and when I insisted upon it after school one day with every ounce of pride and confidence they had easily permitted me the test. Perfection is common to our clan, and with years of training under Fugaku and beside Itachi it is of no doubt that I was so far beyond capable to pass the tests that I emerged that evening -for the exam went immediately after I asked- and at the door awaiting me was Itachi. Black eyes locked to mine as I held out the band and smiled.

"Advice on where to wear it?"

Itachi had given a half smile. "It will help guard your neck." So that is where it remained. I said nothing when from there he led me to the training grounds and new lessons began. I hid my headband under the high collar of my attire as I told no one I graduated. Exhaustion plagued my movements and I fell asleep only to waken just as tired. Chakra control and exercises sometimes came from Itachi showig up with a masked figure, or one that was so ordinary I could tell it was a genjutsu to hide their identity. I did them the honor of respecting their anonymity in exchange for what I was learning.

Itachi ignored his bodies need to sleep to steal time to work with me on genjutsu, he was after all a prodigial master of the art and needed me to learn as fast as possible. Questions no doubt pooled in my eyes but they never fell from my lips for the faith and loyalty I held for this boy, the heir to my clan, was not defeated by petty curiosity.

Every time we went to part after yet another training session there was something to Itachi's dark eyes that told me, just a little longer. Hide you've graduated, hide you are training with me and those I have brought here, just a little longer..and say nothing. Please ask nothing.

Be it unvoiced, I could obey.

It was only a few weeks but with Itachi's level of training and those he brought to me, it felt much longer. A few weeks and then one of the masked forms was there.

"You've never asked." The voice was a woman's and her mask was not ANBU.

"I do not need to." I replied, wondering what the point of this was but I still would not ask. We fell into silence a long time before finally, she nodded.

"I want to bring you into Special Ops, Infiltration."

"I have never heard of this." I told her honestly, I knew of the ANBU, of various smaller groups as all did, I also could hazard Infiltration from what it sounded like.

"Good."

I paused at her answer and since Itachi was not there I had to glance down, lashes covering my eyes as I tried to assert my gift. Was this what Itachi needed of me?

The answer slipped out of my lips strong and certain."Yes."

()()()()()()

Apparently the group was called 'Seed.' Or Pollen depending on how you word it. They'd sometimes call themselves Acorn or Nuts, the last making them all laugh. The point was there was no one true name and it was a very small group. Exceptionally so, with only those who had exacting potential even learning of it.

"We are the ones who gather the intelligence for the ANBU in ways they cannot." Was the soft explanation once I was marked. It was three little dots, all in a row and easily ignored. It was a very specific seal that kept us from talking about the organization and any information we gathered for it save to those in the know already. Only once the ink was freshly burrowed into my skin and chakra pulsed subtly below the marks did they actually tell me anything.

"Itachi brought you to our attention. There's always danger in the higher courts and you'd be amazed how hard it is to blend into those societies. They are hyper aware of lineage and breeding."

I nod, thinking of my distant relatives. This is part of why they sought me out but Itachi had broken the privacy seal that night he asked me to graduate early and it turns out that the group was observing me. They saw I could take orders, carry them out, and not question them. They saw my determination and my instincts were dead on. A few even said it was a little eerie how swiftly I adapted to all the information they had let slip when working with me. For a group that needs to infiltrate the upper most levels of society, or those pretending to be such, not asking questions is critical. Those people are the wariest and you need them to come to you.

Quietly I was given to a calm and quiet sensei who did not exist outside of a henge my new team would take. I was the sixth member of the group but we would often in time, work entirely alone I was told. For now all I would do is train.

That day when I returned to my home no one was there..but as if he had been watching for my chakra the moment the door was latched Itachi was before me. Dark eyes worried as I just smiled at him.

"Does it help?"

"You have it?" Was his soft reply, he did not ask to see thankfully as it was rather low on a hip but he still asked. I nodded and his shoulder's eased. A swift collection of hand signs and we were cloaked from the senses of any who may pry as he sat down in the living room. I joined him and just waited. People like Itachi have to order their thoughts as their minds are just too busy.

"Infiltration can often go with ANBU without being part of ANBU..as information is critical. It's the one regular exception." His hands do not tremble but there is something to the way Itachi holds himself that says he'd like to. That he is worried.

"I told you if you needed me.." Is my response and as I trail off Itachi bows his head.

"You are making me dependent upon the truth of your words, and I cannot fault my affliction. Thank you."

There is so much unspoken in that moment but my heart is content. Perhaps I should be worrying, that I am so willing to do anything for Itachi, but I cannot.


	19. Turtle child

AN: There are people to blame. See what happens when you send me reviews and we start throwing ideas out?! Dangit Lanternfish.

()()()()()()()()

Tsubaki was always ignored. This was a wonderful thing, something her mother always praised her for and her mother's teammate from their early days was frequently found making a huge deal over how well it would serve her in time. Tsubaki _blended_. She had light skin but just dark enough to never be mistaken for a sheltered clan brat. Her hair was straight and deep brown, her eyes likewise were dark. She was slight, didn't draw attention to herself. Her attire was in shades of browns and grays and a little dark olive green at times.

She didn't go to the academy for long. Oh, she went, most children did, but she was so on the lower end of average that it was no secret she'd never be on a passing team in the secondary exams and gently encouraged to just take the genin corps examinations when she came of age. That was fine with her, such a common method of advancement had never been her goal. Indeed, her careful work to ensure she placed in the low average percentile without ever coming near to those who held the hopeless and dead last had been quite the challenge. Especially since it meant hiding her skills in Taijutsu and the like. Still, when mother issued a challenge, Tsubaki was determined to surpass it.

For that, her mothers once teammate was jokingly to blame. Well, her teammate for all of a day, her mother would laughingly recall as they did not pass the second exam and thus began the slow drudgery of the days of one in genin corps and her mother's scratching to get free, to make herself earn field promotions until the accident.

Tsubaki couldn't complain. When her mother's injuries, chakra burns to the nervous system and skin, muscle rendering her permanently disfigured compared to most and a little hard of hearing on one side, sometimes unable to move for a lengthy time, left her incapable of caring for her child on the worst of the days? That was when her sole living teammate had stepped in and Tsubaki was well used to Gai and his quietly boisterous enthusiasm. Quiet only because her mother would usually be sleeping, if lucky because pain filled days were ones of long misery where sound and breathing hurt her much less light or even holding perfectly still. On those days the Jounin would show up after she tapped out a special code on one of her pet turtle's shells. He'd have his arms full of food and things they could work on and very softly whisper to her as he helped her stretch and do basic exercises. Sometimes he'd have books for her and laugh- oh so careful to be silent- over getting ones so beyond her comprehension and do his best to explain them.

He'd always tell her to call him Gai. Just Gai.

Tsubaki hadn't needed to guess why. Her hair was brown, her eyes were brown, but the shape of them, the slightly more strong nose she held, the way her fingers curved? That was certainly not from her mother. She was a clever child though, and the first lessons her mother had given her were to be silent, to observe, and to never confront someone with information unless you needed to.

So if Gai didn't want to admit she was his daughter, it didn't hurt. Not when he was always there anyway and she saw that while they did not love each other like the married couples she saw, Gai and Ami certainly had a deep fondness for each other. They were there for her, loved her. That was enough.


End file.
